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c: THE 

AMERICAN PATRIOT 

BY 

/ 

CHARLES F. DOLE 

AUTHOR OF 

THE LITTLE CITIZEN, THE CITIZEN'S CATECHISM, 
TALKS ON CITIZENSHIP, ETC., ETC. 



ISSUED BY 

THE PATRIOTIC LEAGUE 

ORGANIZED TO PROCLAIM THE NECES- 
SITY FOR SYSTEMATIC INSTRUCTION IN CITIZEN- 
SHIP IN THE SCHOOLS AND OUT OF THEM; TO CULTIVATE 
THE KNOWLEDGE OF AMERICAN PRINCIPLES, LAWS, HISTORY AND 
PROGRESS, AND TO INSTIL AMERICAN IDEAS INTO THE 
MINDS AND HEARTS OF AMERICANS, NATIVE AND 
ADOPTED, OF BOTH SEXES AND ALL AGES, 
SECTS AND PARTIES 




NEW YORK 
THE PATRIOTIC LEAGUE 



'rary ( 



44238 

"OUR COUNTRY" SERIES 



TWO COPIES RECEIVED. 



PUBLISHD BY 






THE PATRIOTIC LEAGUE 




THE LITTLE CITIZEN, also called ; ' THE YOUNG CITIZE 

Dole, is in the form of questions and answers, for the same purpose as the 
"Citizen's Catechism " but written especially for young children. Its simplici- 
ty renders it no less attractive to children of the larger growth. Cloth, 35 cents. 

THE CITIZEN'S CATECHISM by Charles F. Dole, revised by many eminent social^ 
and political scientists, is designed to present in compact simple form the principle ~ 
ideas of citizenship. State and City School Superintendents in every part of the 
country have written commendations of this book, and the opinion has been ex- 
pressed by several of them that ability to answer its questions intelligently should 
be a requisite to naturalization of foreigners. It has been adopted for use in the 
public schools of New York, Philadelphia, New Haven and other places. 

Paper, 10 cts., cloth, 35 cts. 

TALKS ON CITIZENSHIP, by Charles F. Dole follows the arrangement of topics in 
the " Citizen's Catechism.'' The two books can be used to advantage together or 
separately. Cloth, 50 cts. 

THE AMERICAN PATRIOT, by Charles F. Dole ; discusses in the most simple and 
charming way the principles and right practices of citizenship. Cloth, 50 cts. 

OUTLINE OF AMERICAN GOVERNMENT, for teachers and pupils of high schools 
and lower grades, prepared especially for schools that adopt the Gill School City 
government, by Delos F. Wilcox, Ph.D. and Wilson L. Gill, LL.B. Cloth, 50 cts. 

MUNICIPAL AFFAIRS, by John R. Commons, is most instructive and entertaining 
about those features of the city concerning which it is the interest and duty of 
every man, woman and child to be familiar. Cloth, 50 cts. 

CITY PROBLEMS, by Delos F. Wiicox Ph. D., for grammar and high schools. 
Five chapters on Fresh Air, Light and Room for Play, The City's Waste, Life, 
Property and Good Order; The City's Finances; The Citizen — His Rights and 
Duties. Cloth, 35 cts. 

AMERICAN IDEAS, by Thomas R, Slicer, a series of talks to young people on the 
principles of American citizenship. In press. 

WASHINGTON, abridged from lrving's Life of Washington. Cloth. 35 cts. 

FRANKLIN, by Henry M. Leipziger, Ph. D.. from autobiography. " 35 cts. 

JAY, by Wm. Jay Schieffelin, abridged from Life of Jay by Wm. Jay. '" 35 cts. 

COLONEL WARING, sketches by Albert Shaw and others. " 35 cts. 

STORIES FOR LITTLE CITIZENS, by Bolton Hall, John R. Commons and Miss 
Jennie B. Merrill, Supervisor of New York public kindergartens, and others to 
convey lessons in citizenship to the " wee ones,' are full of delights. This is in 
course of preparation. 

OUR COUNTRY, monthly magazine of the Patriotic League, published at 
7 East 16th St., New York, ten months each year, is $2 yearly, sample copy 10 cts. 
sent free to active members of the Patriotic League. The above described 
books are published serially, and others will follow on law, biography, histo- 
ry and other matters pertaining to intelligent citizenship. 

THE PATRIOTIC LEAGUE is chartered to promote the cause of systematic instruc- 
tion in citizenship. Membership is open to all. It furnishes to active mem- 
bers through OUR COUNTRY free of charge, a three years' course of instruc- 
tion in citizenship. Active members pay annual dues $ 1.50, in chapters of 10 or 
more members, $ 1 each. Members of the Alpha Chapter pay $ 5 or more a year. 



COPYRIGHT, 1899, BY THF PATRIOTIC LEAGUE 



•econo oopv. 



OUR COUNTRY SERIES 

OF BOOKS 



TTHIS is one of a series of small books designed by the 
Patriotic League to convey some ideas of practical 
patriotism and to cultivate the spirit of helpful kindness. 
Such books alone, if perfectly adapted to their purpose and 
put into the hands of young people, will, now and then, 
prove to be good seed fallen on good ground. It is well, 
however, for those who wish to be a blessing to the young 
people to recognize the fact that, as a rule, putting good 
books into the hands of boys and girls will not accomplish 
for them the thing that each one needs. On the other 
hand, they are glad to be led by older persons whom they 
respect, and they must have wise and constant leading 
and encouragement, if best results are to be gained. 

The Patriotic League does not hope to see American 
citizenship rise to the plane of perfection simply by means 
of teaching the words or the thoughts contained in the 
precepts of morality, but by daily and constant training 
of the children in the application of right principles to 
their actions at play and work, in the school and wherever 
they may be. Necessary to such training is a successful 
presentation of right principles, which is the aim of the 
Patriotic League authors. To aid in this training and prac- 
tice the President of the Patriotic League devised the 
' ' Gill School City," which has proved to be useful for its 
purpose. By this means the pupils become actual citizens 
of a republic, instead of subjects of the ordinary old style 
monarchical school government. In connection with this 
is the "School State" and "School Republic. " 



PREFACE 



The series of "Our Country" Boohs of which this 
book is one, is issued under the authority of the following 
named men and women who are officers of 

THE PATRIOTIC LEAGUE 

Address all mail to P. O. Station O, N.Y. 

GENERAL OFFICERS 

WILSON L. GILL, Pres't, JAMES T. WHITE, Secy, ALEXANDER M. HADDEN, Treas, 

COUNCIL: 
ABRAM S. HEWITT, Ex-Mayor of N. Y. O. O. HOWARD, Maj. Gen. U. S. A. 

EDWARD EVERETT HALE JAMES A. BEAVER. Ex-Gov. of Pa. 

DORMAN B.EATON, Ex U. S. Civil Service Commissioner 

HONORARY and ADVISORY BOARD: 

WM. McKINLEY, President of the U. S. JOSIAH STRONG, Pres. Social Service Lgue. 

GROVER CLEVELAND, Ex-President WM. H. P. FAUNCE, Pres. Brown University 

BENJAMIN HARRISON, Ex-President ISIDOR STRAUS, Pres. Educational Alliance 

GEORGE DEWEY, Admiral, U. S. Navy FRANCIS E. CLARK, Father of Chr. Endeav. 

LEONARD WOOD. Brig. Gen. U. S. A. W. S. RAINSFORD, D. D. 

THEODORE ROOSEVELT, Governor, N.Y. THOMAS McMILLAN, Paulist Father, 

SIMON GRATZ, Ex-Pres. Phila.Bd Pub Ed. Gen. T. J. MORGAN, Ex-lnd. Com. 

C. R. WOODRUFF, Sec, Natl. Munic. Lgue WM. A. GILES, Civic Federation, Chicago 

P. V. N. MYERS, Dean Univ. of Cin'ti MERRILL E. GATES, Ex-Pres Amherst Col 

T. M. BALLIET Supt. Schools, Springfield WALTER L. HERVY, City Exmnr N.Y. Schls 

HERBERT WELSH, Pres. Natl. Indian Rights Assn. Mrs. MARY LOWE DICKINSON 

ALICE M. BIRNEY, Pres. Nat' I Congress of Mothers JOHN LEWIS CLARK 

LA SALLE A. MAYNARD, JOHN W. HEGEMAN, RUFORD FRANKLIN, JACOB A. RIIS 

R. FULTON CUTTING, Pres. Association for Improving the Condition of the Poor 

WILLIAM L. STRONG, Ex-Mayor of N.Y., President of the Alpha Chapter, 

JOHN H. C. NEVIUS, Vice Pres. Alpha Chapter, Col. HENRY HERSCHELL ADAMS, 

ARTHUR GOADBY, Sec. and Treas. " " ROBERT S. MacARTHUR, D. D. 

WM. JAY SCHIEFFELIN, Ex-City Civil Serv.Com. Mrs. ESTHER HERRMAN, 

Gen. JOHN EATON, Ex-U.S.Com. of Eden, late Director of Public Instruction, Porto Rico 

LIFE MEMBERS: 

WILLIAM E. DODGE, GEORGE D. MACKAY, WILLIAM IVES WASHBURN, BERNARD 
CRONSON, Mrs. JOHN L. GILL, DANIEL B. WESSON, JOHN A. CASS, HENRY B. 
METCALF, JOHN J. McCOOK, Mrs. SAMUEL R.PERCY, Mrs. LOUIS L. TODD. 

LEAGUE INSTRUCTORS: 

CHARLES F. DOLE, THOMAS R. SLICER, 

JAMES ALBERT WOODBURN, Indiana University 

JOHN R. COMMONS and JAMES H.HAMILTON, Syracuse University 

HENRY M. LEIPZIGER, Supervisor, Free Public Lectures, N. Y. Public Schools 

M. L. DE LUCE, University of Cincinnati, KATE B. SHERWOOD, 

ALBERT SHAW, Editor " Review of Reviews" 

WM. C. ROBINSON, Yale College and Catholic University of America 

GEORGE W. KIRCHWEY, FRANCIS M. BURDICK and FRANK J. GOODNOW, 

Columbia Univ. DELOS F.WILCOX, MILO R.MALTBIE, Ed. " Municipal Affairs'* 



IN riEMORIAn : JOHN JAY, ELLIOT F. SHEPARD, GEO. E. WARING, JR., 
JOSEPH LAMB, SAMUEL FRANCIS SMITH. 



CONTENTS 





iJOPtl 

Chapter i. 




What Kind of a Mar 


i Makes a Patriot 
Chapter 2. 


7 


What Education is F 


: or . 
Chapter 3. 


U 


The Education that Makes Patriots 


19 




Chapter 4. 




The Hampton Idea 


• • • « 

Chapter 5. 


26 


Our Liberties 


Chapter 6„ 


34 


Laws Equal for All 


e • e 

Chapter 7. 


41 


Rights and Duties 


Chapter 8. 


47 


The Business of Rulers . 


53 




Chapter 9. 




Who the Privileged 


Class is in America 
Chapter 10. 


59 


The Majority 


Chapter ii. 


. 65 


Minorities and Their 


Rights 
Chapter i2„ 


71 


Trusting the People 


Chapter 13. 


77 


Public Opinion 


• 
Chapter 14. 


84 


How to Treat Foreig 


ners . 


90 




THE PRINCIPLES OF AMERICAN CITIZENSHIP 

AS TAUGHT BY 

THE PATRIOTIC LEAGUE 

Whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them. 

\A/E BELIEVE, In the principles of the Declaration of Independence — That all 
men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain in- 
alienable rights ; that among these are lifj, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. 

We believe, That good character, helpful kindness, to all creatures and civic intel- 
ligence are the basis of true citizenship. 

We believe, That the public, in assuming the education of children, becomes 
responsible to them not only for physical, industrial, mental and moral cult- 
ure, but also for special training, to the end that they shall be most happy 
useful and patriotic while children, and be intelligent and faithful citizens. 

We believe, That it is our duty to consecrate ourselves to the service of our country 
to study the history and principles of our Government, to faithfully discharge all 
obligations of citizenship, to improve our laws and their administration, and to 
do all which may fulfil the ideal of the founders of our Republic — a government 
of the people, for the people and by the people, of equal rights for all and special 
privileges for none — and to the maintenance of such a government we mutually 
pledge to one another our lives, our fortunes and our sacred honor. 

We believe, That we should endeavor to lead others to understand, accept and 
extend these principles, and to uphold and defend the institutions of our country. 



THE YOUNG CITIZEN'S PLEDGE 

I AM a CITIZEN of AMERICA and HEIR to all her Greatness and Renown. 

As the health and happiness of my body depend upon each muscle and nerv 
and drop of blood doing its work in its place, so the health and happiness of my 
country depend upon each citizen doing his work in his place. I will not fill any 
post, nor pursue any business where I shall live upon my fellow-citizens without doing 
them useful service in return ; for I plainly see that this must bring suffering and 
want to some of us. 

As it is cowardly for a soldier to run away from the battle, so it is cowardly 
for any citizen not to contribute his share to the well-being of his country. America 
is my own dear land ; she nourishes me, and I will love her and do my duty to her 
whose child, servant and civic soldier I am. 

I will do nothing to desecrate her soil or pollute her air, or to degrade her 
children, who are my brothers and sisters. I will try to make her cities beautiful 
and her citizens healthy and glad so that she may be a most desirable home for her 
children in days to come. 

I accept +he Principles of the Patriotic League for my own and I will do the 
best I can to live and act by them every day. 




THE AMERICAN PATRIOT. 



Chapter i. 

WHAT KIND OF A MAN MAKES A PATRIOT? 

Men may be divided roughly into two classes. There 
is a very large class whose chief aim in life is to get what 
they can out of it for themselves. They propose to have 
the advantage of others. They mean to ride on top of 
the coach. I will not say that they deliberately intend to 
steal a ride. Often they do not even see that when they 
ride, other men are dragging them. I will not say that 
they are not willing to put themselves to any trouble or 
to exert themselves. On the contrary, they frequently 
show uncommon enterprise in climbing to the top of the 
coach and in keeping their seats. I would even grant 
perhaps more than Mr. Edward Bellamy, when he used 
this old parable of the coach, and allow that the riders 
imagine that it is important to all the others that they 
should continue to ride. They may honestly believe that 
the coach would not run at all unless they were on 
the top of it. My point simply is that a large proportion 
of mankind thinks it the chief object of life to ride through 
this world as easily and comfortably as possible. They 
desire this for themselves; they generally propose this for 
their children. We will not for the present complain that 
there is any harm in this. We merely state the fact that 
a large number of mankind belong to the class of those 
who wish to get for themselves all that they can. I do not 
know any better name for them than the selfish people. 



8 THE AMERICAN PA TRIOT 

There is also a class of men and women, who honestly 
think that they are here in this world on purpose to do 
their fair and full share for helping on the life of all of us. 
Yes, there are a good many people who do not prefer 
merely to ride through life, but if there is walking and 
dragging to be done, they choose to do at least their part 
of the hard work. In short, if you could imagine all the 
work of human society — all the lifting necessary for get- 
ting the world on towards the higher levels, to be divided 
into units of effort, and each person in the world to be 
assigned his proper portion of all this effort, while one set 
of people would like to get rid of their share and to con- 
trive to have it done for them by others, there are those 
who would desire, and insist upon undertaking a little 
more than their exact share of the effort. 

I said that our two classes were only roughly divided 
from each other. It is hard to draw the exact line where 
the sea and the ocean meet. So there are many who 
sometimes appear to be thoroughly selfish, but on occa- 
sion do quite generous and social things. I can illustrate 
what I mean in this way. There was a man who hired 
a certain farm which he proceeded to exploit. He got off 
it all that he could, and he did the least possible to enrich 
it or keep the weeds down. He let the buildings and 
fences get out of repair and he cut and sold the timber. 
Thus he ran the farm down so that it was nearly worth- 
less to the man who should come after him. But while 
he lived by exploiting the farm, he was not altogether a 
bad fellow. He always gave a meal to the tramps who 
came to his door, and he put his name down for sub- 
scriptions to his church and its charitable societies. 
Nevertheless, I think he belonged, on the whole, to the 
class of shirks and the selfish people. So did the rich man 
in the next town who made his money by a shoddy con- 
tract in the war, who, however, endowed a school with 
some of the money. We shall have to put him and his 
money on the selfish side of the line. 



THE AMERICAN PA TRIOT. 9 

What I want now to make perfectly plain is that the 
selfish people have no place in a republic like ours. Other 
governments, indeed, have been arranged with special 
reference to them. A despotism, with its emperor or sul- 
tan and his parasites on one hand, and a horde of serfs on 
the other, was a special arrangement to allow a selfish 
class to exploit the others and live out of their toil and 
their taxes. An aristocracy of noble families was a con- 
venient government for the same purpose. One set of 
people thus had the land and the offices, and the rest sup- 
ported them. Nearly all Europe bore this kind of burden 
for centuries. Most European countries are still under it. 
The ancient republics too were an ingenious arrangement 
for selfish people to have more than their share. At old 
Athens, a few thousand free families lived on the labor of 
perhaps ten times as many slaves. When a slave became 
free, he wanted likewise to become a master and to lord 
it over others. 

We have changed all this in America. As soon as any- 
one thought out the noble motto, "Government of the 
people, by the people, for the people,'' it was the same as 
putting up a notice — " Selfish people not wanted here ! " 
Our government is founded on the great motto. It 
means that everyone here is to have his full share of 
rights, but it means also that everyone is to bear his full 
share of duties. Now for almost the first time in the his- 
tory of the world is true human society like a great family. 

If anyone gets more than his share, he gets it against 
the idea of a republic ; he gets it as an aristocrat or a 
"favorite. If anyone tries to get more than his share 
for himself, he tries to snatch what belongs to all. If 
anyone, on the other hand, does more than his exact 
share, he makes the republic richer. If all would try to 
do their utmost, all would be doing what is the avowed 
purpose of the people of a commonwealth. 

Let us put this very definitely. There is a man (we 
will call him Mr. Jones) who wants to be alderman in a 



i o THE AMERICAN PATRIOT. 

certain city. Why does he want the office ? He wants it to 
please his own ambition, because he can wear a title ; or 
he wants it in the hope of being mayor later ; or he 
wants it for the salary, or even for the chances that it will 
offer to make money. And how does this man propose 
to get the office ? He proposes to ask all his friends to 
vote for him ; he proposes to lay his wires to capture the 
nomination ; in other words, as far as he can, he proposes 
to elect himself. Now what has happened to our beauti- 
ful American motto, if this man is elected? It is govern- 
ment of the people still, but this is all that is left. It is 
government by Mr. Jones and for Mr. Jones. This is the 
same sort of government as they had in the time of Caesar; 
or, as they have now in Turkey. The very idea of Re- 
publican government is gone. The fact is, selfishness 
in getting office or in using it kills the American common- 
wealth. 

Let us take another illustration. Mr. Smith will not go 
into politics at all. He can do better for himself. He has 
exploited a great railroad property. He has invested 
money in the Whiskey Trust. If he were asked 
to show what good he had ever contributed to the 
commonwealth of America, or for what reason he 
draws an income of fifty thousand dollars a year from 
the labor of all the people, he could not answer a word. 
On the contrary, the commonwealth is poorer than it 
would be if he had never lived. Exactly what now, has 
this man done? Under a government that exists for the 
people, he has used the laws and the protection which 
they give against the common good of the people and for 
himself. The robber barons who built their castles on 
the Rhine to waylay those who could not protect them- 
selves were doing nothing different in principle from 
this rich Mr. Smith. He is a survival of the evil old times. 
But he is at war with the American Commonwealth; and 
equally so is the clerk in an office, or the school boy who 
sees this great greedy man pass, and envies him. or 



THE AMERICAN PATRIOT. 



r i 



would do the same things, if the chance came in his way. 

Call all such men and boys foreigners together — though 
their forefathers may have come over in the Mayflower — 
for they do not belong in America. But do not call Carl 
Schurz a foreigner, nor Boyle O'Reilly, nor the humblest 
Russian Jew just arrived in New York, so he has come 
here to add his little life to the common good and the 
Commonwealth. 

No man, indeed, is a foreigner here, who believes in 
the motto that makes our American Government. It 
is of the people, by the people, for the people. 

We have then at once the test of the patriot. The 
patriot in America is a different kind of man, and has a 
different object in life from the Athenian 
patriot, or the Florentine patriot, or 
almost any other kind of patriot who 
ever lived before our government was 
founded. These other patriots defended 
themselves and their own children; they 
fought to hold their own power and the 
privileges of their own class. The Amer- 
ican patriot lives for the great Common- 
wealth. He does not defend merely 
he does not vote for his own rights 
or his own interests. Show him what is best for all the 
people. He stands to defend and serve them. So Wash- 
ington and the founders of the Republic seem to com- 
mand. So Abraham Lincoln and the men who died in 
the Civil War, urge. What American youth will not heed 
their heroic call 1 




his own rights ; 



12 THE AMERICAN PATRIOT 

Questions 
Into what two classes may men be divided? To which 

class do you wish to belong? What harm does a shirk 

do? 
What was the injustice in most old-world governments, as 

in Athens, Rome, Venice, Austria ? What injustice, 

if any, is there to-day, when a rich man does nothing 

but only lives on his income? 
What is the true motto of our Republic? What right has 

a man to wish to get a public office for his own sake? 

Do you know of men who are in office for the sake'of 

the public good? 
What kind of men might we call foreigners ? Whom 

shall we call our true countrymen? Give your highest 

idea of what it is to be a patriot. Name some of our 

patriots and show what they did for our country. 

Name patriots who helped us in time of peace. 



" Every man is called to the service of others." 

"Not what we give, but what we share, 
For the gift without the giver is bare." 

Life is a mission. Every other definition of life is false 
and leads all who accept it astray. Religion, science, 
philosophy, though still at variance upon many points — 
all agree in this, that every existence is an aim — Ma^ini. 

Is it not when we come out of ourselves and do some- 
thing for some other one; when we forget to seek after 
our own pleasure and seek it for another; when we are 
lost to our own comfort and find it for those around us — 
is it not then, that we are making happiest the day ? 



*L^lbfe Qtizenship 





%&j&^ 



THE AMERICAN PATRIOT 

Chapter 2 
WHAT EDUCATION IS FOR 

We have a new idea in America. We hold that every 
one must have an education. It makes no difference how 
poor a child's parents are. They may not be able to pay 
a cent for the cost of the schools. They may think that 
they need to keep their children at home to help them 
earn their bread. They may not even wish to send their 
children to school and the children may not care to go. 
Nevertheless, we say that the children of the poorest and 
most ignorant people in the slums of the great cities and 
on the plantations at the South, where the blacks live, 
must all have an education. We are all the time building 
more beautiful schoolhouses at the public expense. Some 
of the newer buildings are worthy to be compared with 
kings' palaces. We have an army of superintendents and 
teachers. We spend on our public education not far from 
one hundred and fifty millions of dollars a year. This is 
as though we set apart all the constant labor of 300,000 
men to pay for the schools. We will not let the parents 
off who keep their children away from school. But in 
many States we have laws to require the children to go 
to school during a good part of each year. 

I have called this plan of giving every one an education, 
whether he wishes it or not, a new idea in the world. 
Of course, there have been enlightened men, like King 
Alfred of England long ago, who have always believed 
in education. But the common idea used to be that the 
people who did the hard work, the slaves and serfs, did 
not need to be educated. Indeed, education might make 
the toilers discontented. 



14 THE AMERICAN PA TRIGT 

Why is it that in all civilized countries the old idea is 
passing away, and the new plan of educating every one 
is coming to be popular? Why is it that the rich people 
are perfectly willing to be taxed to pay for the schooling 
of other people's children? A great many persons think 
that education is "a very good thing," without knowing 
why. Much less, they do not know why all of us ought 
to be compelled to pay our share to maintain the schools, 
and why truant officers should hunt up reluctant boys. 




ALFRED AND HIS MOTHER. 



Alfred, the greatest King of early England, reigned through the last quarter of t> J 
ninth century. When he began to reign, there was scarcely a priest south of tl'<? 
Thames who knew the language of the people. Green, in his " History of the Englisn 
People," says that the world had never before " seen a king who lived solely for th«« 
good of his people." He established schools and translated books for their use. 

I wish, therefore, to make it very plain precisely why w 
in America believe in universal education. 

Let us first, however, see what there is in some of thv 
reasons that people often give for getting an education. 
They want an education, they say, so as to be able to earn 
a better living and to have more money. If a man has ? 
good education, he need not work with his hands, he can 
be a clerk in a store, and rise to be a merchant, or he can 
be a lawyer or a doctor. A girl need not cook and wash 
dishes, but she can be a teacher or enter a profession. An 
education thus enables one "to do better for one's self." 

It is in line with this same idea that we hear demands 
for trade schools, where boys and girls can learn carpen- 
tering and dressmaking, so that they may earn a better 



THE AMERICAN PA TRIOT 1 5 

living. All this is very well, but what shall we do for the 
millions of people who must still work on the roads, and in 
the mines, and upon the land ? We want them educated, 
whether they earn more money or not. We want the girls 
educated who cook in a myriad homes and never become 
teachers or doctors. We fear, if people expect education 
to give every one better pay, that many will be disap- 
pointed in this. The fact is, we believe in education for 
a better reason than the money that there is in it. 

There is a generous reason why Americans believe in 
education. We see that many children are born into the 
world, with all the odds against them. They are poor ; their 
parents do not always speak the English language; their 
homes are forlorn. We want to "even things up" for the 
unfortunate children. We want to give them a fair chance 
with others. We desire to open \he avenues that lead up 
to happiness. 

This is a good reason for education, but it is not the 
great reason. In fact, the world has found that the getting 
knowledge and reading books are not sure to make people 
happier or more capable men and women. People who 
read the newspapers are often the least contented. People 
who read may despise their own work, without being 
the least able to do better work. 

Neither is it clear that merely sending children to 
schools, however excellent, really educates them. Men and 
women of the older generation, who had to work hard to 
earn their own education, were as well educated as any of 
us. Abraham Lincoln got a splendid education, albeit a 
hardly earned one. The truth is, there must be some ob- 
ject in education greater and higher than bettering one's 
own condition, whether by getting more pay,or by being 
able to use the public library. 

The chief end of education is not sefilsh, but the public 
good. I will put this first in a negative way. There is a 
foe to our great Republic. The name of this foe is Igno- 
rance. It began to be a foe as soon as our forefathers es- 



1 6 THE AMERICAN PA TRIOT 

tablished a free government. There were always those 
in the land who could not read. It was managed for a 
time that the balance of power was kept in the hands of 
those who held property, who generally had education 
also. But it did not seem fair in a republic, like ours, to 
keep people out of power because they were poor. The 
poor and the rich, the illiterate and the educated, were giv- 
en equal power on the ground of their common manhood. 
Meanwhile, a multitude of all nationalities emigrated to our 
shores. Whether wisely or not, they were speedily made 
citizens. After the Civil War, the blacks in the South 
were given the ballot. 

It has come to pass that at every election men vote who 
know nothing of the questions which their votes help to 
decide, or of the character of the men for or against whom 
they vote. Ignorant voters are led to the polls by preju- 
dice or passion, or even by bribery. Ignorance may easily 
be made to turn an election, to the mischief of the very 
men who are bribed or befooled. Ignorance may be 
cheated out of its fair vote and made to count to the credit 
of oppression, or of some vile interest, such as the saloon 
power. The most selfish demagogue relies upon Igno- 
rance to carry him to power. In power, he relies on the 
same Ignorance not to know of his mischievous practices. 
Thus Ignorance is the foe of the Republic. We must 
fight this foe by intelligence. We cannot bear to have 
illiterate voters. We cannot afford to have voters merely 
read, without intelligence to ask questions about what 
they read. 

We want more from our schools than to fight Ignorance. 
We propose to train for the public good a special class of 
citizens. We showed in the last chapter what kind of man 
or woman makes a patriot. The public schools are intend- 
ed to produce patriots. This is the great positive use of 
the schools. 

Let us make this point quite clear. We can think of 
certain men who have graduated from our public schools, 



THE AMERICAN PA TRIOT 17 

possibly from the high schools and state universities, 
and have become very successful in getting money and 
office. But the success of the men of whom I now speak 
has done vast public harm. Their money has been made 
at the general loss. The offices have been used, as under 
the Tweed ring in New York, to plunder the people. It 
is plain that when the schools educate men and women 
to help them be more mightily selfish, the schools do more 
harm than good. 

There are also men educated at the large cost of the 
public, who, though they do not plunder the people or 
seek office for their own ends, nevertheless, are the poorest 
and most inefficient citizens. Sometimes they will not 
take the trouble to vote; or they vote as their selfish 
interests dictate, without asking what is good for the 
people. Sometimes they pay their money to help elect 
rogues to office, or to keep them in power. These care- 
less citizens are no better for having an education. If the 
public trained only such as these, it would really be wiser 
not to have any public schools. 

It follows that the only really good use of the schools is 
when they give us intelligent patriots. We need men like 
Peter Cooper of New York, like George William Curtis, 
like President Garfield. These men's education made 
them feel a grand sense of public duty. Their lives did 
not belong to themselves to do as they chose, but they 
belonged to the nation, exactly like that of a soldier who 
has enlisted and sworn to obey orders. We need a great 
army of such men in times of peace, as well as in times 
of war, who, after the words of the old Roman motto,are 
pledged to see to it "that the Republic receives no harm." 
We need such women as well as men ; for whether women 
vote or not, all the men who are good for anything are 
pretty sure to come from homes where noble and patri- 
otic women preside. 

Let us fix it, then, in our minds forever, that the great 
end and use of the schools is to educate men and women 



i a THE AMERICAN PA TRIOT 

to be patriots. Unless the schools do this work, they are 
a gigantic failure. It is because the schools are not yet 
doing this great work, and also because they need all 
possible help to do it better, that we believe in organizing 
the Patriotic League everywhere; for the people who love 
their country must join hands together in order to do any- 
thing efficiently. 

I might urge upon our youth their duty to the State as 
a matter of common honesty. I might show how much 
it costs to give every one of them an education. The cost 
comes out of the wealth of the country. The youth has 
done nothing yet but receive what is given him. Whether 
he is in a public or a private school he is rolling up a 
debt. His honor is pledged, as soon as he can, to repay 
this debt to the world. 

But I will not press this matter of duty. There is some- 
thing better than duty. The true-hearted youth has a 
splendid privilege. There is nothing that he will ever 
like better than to stand on the side of the great heroes 
and patriots, and to help carry on their work. The shin- 
ing examples of all the glorious past are on this side. 
Justice, truth, liberty, religion are on this side. Noble 
company is always on this side, as truly to-day as it was 
in the time of John Milton — the company of the brave, the 
faithful and the generous. 

Questions 

What is our American idea about education? What do the 

schools cost where you live? 
What is the first reason that people give for believing in 

education? What can you say about this reason? 
What generous reason is there for our public schools ? 

Do you think that education makes people happier? 

Which is the chief reason for our public schools ? How 

is ignorance an enemy to the commonwealth? 
What special kind of citizens do we aim to train? Show 

how men may be educated and yet be bad citizens. 

Give examples of the kind of good citizens that we need. 
What can patriotic women do? How can the Patriotic 

League help the schools? How is it ' 'common honesty'' 

to serve the State? How is it a privilege to live the life 

of a patriot? 





THE AMERICAN PATRIOT. 



Chapter 3. 
THE EDUCATION THAT MAKES PATRIOTS. 

It is not every kind of education that will make good 
citizens, or patriots. There is a certain school of whose 
results I stand in fear. The school-house is excellent and 
quite up to the mark of the latest sanitary science. The 
course of study is ample and attractive. But it is whis- 
pered about among the parents of its scholars, that the 
master of this school worships money. His reputation 
is coming to be that of a selfish and shallow man. I 
fear, in spite of the admirable equipment of his school, 
that this teacher will not serve to make good citizens. 
Boys, like wax, will take the pattern of this kind of man. 
They will think it fine to be " smart" and showy. When 
their teacher, in his public exercises on the twenty-second 
of February, tells them the story of Washington, I fear a 
fatal lack of the thrill of genuine admiration in his voice 
to make the boys know the heart of a patriot. Washing- 
ton held that he was in this world to serve his country. 
I fear that this selfish teacher will let the boys think that 
a man is here for what he can get for himself. So far as 
a teacher's influence runs this way, it is as though the 
arrows were not aimed at the mark. The more costly 
the equipment, the greater is the waste. 

The first thing then that we want for the education of 
true American citizens is teachers of the patriotic quality. 
1 believe that we have a great many such teachers. I 



20 THE AMERICAN PA TRIOT. 

recollect one who took by storm the hearts of the boys 
and girls of a certain country village. The school-ltottse 
was little. The scholars were not graded. The number 
of classes was too large. There were no fine globes or 
gi eat colored maps, or any of the modern equipment in 
the school. The desks were old and hacked with jack- 
knives. But the education here went straight to the 




mark. Why ? Because the teacher knew what it was tor, 
and his aim was true. He was an unselfish man, work- 
ing with all his might to help the boys and girls to the 
best he knew. I would rather see a ragged Indian with 
his old-fashioned bow and arrow aiming at his mark and 
hitting it, than the most elegant marksman with a beauti- 
ful modern rifle, who, nevertheless, hits the wrong mark 
every time. And so I would rather have my child in the 
old wooden school-house under the genuine teacher, 
working to make true-hearted American citizens, than in 
the great palatial city school-house without the right sort 
of teacher. 

The figure arises at once of one — the type of many 
others — in one of these modern school-house palaces, 
who is not the worse surely for the magnificent equip- 
ment with which the rich city has provided her. No 
nobler heart beats than this modest teacher's ; nowhere 
will you find a more unselfish or devoted life ; no great 



THE AMERICAN PA TRIOT. 2 1 

historic patriot ever saw more clearly the end towards 
which glorious deeds move ; no minister of religion in 
any great city pulpit is more faithfully teaching the way of 
faith, hope and love. Year by year, before each new 
group of pupils, this earnest teacher, grudging no extra 
time or pains, is quietly setting an object lesson of what 
all education is for, namely, high-minded, unselfish serv- 
ice. 

It must not be forgotten that, in the broadest sense, the 
education of the citizen is directed from the home. What 
is the ruling purpose of the home ? What are the parents 
thinking about, planning for, talking of? Is it the getting 
the better of their neighbors or competitors ? Is the cur- 
rent table-talk about bargains, about stocks, about corner- 
lots, about parties and fashions and dress ? All this is 
education of a kind. It will be a rare school and mar- 
velous teachers that will be able to turn the current of this 
kind of home training. Who will take boys and girls 
fresh from homes, where the people think that life con- 
sists in making money or in getting into society, and out 
of this raw material will give us the finished product in 
patriots, ready to die for the country ? Yet this miracle 
can be worked. Nay ! It is not a miracle. For the 
germ of the patriot is in every child's heart, to be found 
and called into action by the touch of the first noble life 
that will believe in and seek it. 

Let us suppose now, what often is true, that our 
scholars come from good homes, that they hear over the 
breakfast table some really high-minded conversation 
that their parents do generous things and steer their lives 
by the stars ; let us suppose that they come into the 
hands of good teachers who know for what high end the 
public have set them to teaching ; let us try to estimate 
the magnificent means which we find provided for mak- 
ing boys and girls into patriotic American citizens. 

First, let us see what the teacher can do through the 
discipline of a well graded and appointed school. A 



2 2 THE AMERICAN PA TRIOT. 

child may come from a tenement-house in the slums, from 
surroundings of filth and disorder, from slovenly rooms, 
from traditions of foreign oppression and inequality. The 
great school-house becomes at once the embodiment of 
order, equality, justice, democracy. Promptitude and ex- 
actness; kindness and obedience are required of all. From 
the realm of the kindergarten upwards good-will rules. 
Good-will is seen to be, what it truly is in the universe, 
the sovereign authority. The sooner the child falls into 
line with the regnant good-will, the better it is for him 
and the happier he is. Here the child who stands out 
against the prevailing order is the exception. He is do- 
ing that which hurts himself as well as the others. He 
discovers disorder and misrule to be senselessness. All 
the forces of the school press upon him and bind him over 
to be one of the friends of order and good-will. To be 
disobedient is to be a nuisance in the little world of the 
school. To be selfish or unhelpful is to be isolated from 
the good fellowship of his mates. To be courteous, to be 
kind, to be generous is to enter into the true comrade- 
ship of the school-room. Here is the citizen in the pro- 
cess of making. Here are traits and qualities developing, 
which will make their possessor at home wherever he 
carries them. Learning to be on the side of order as far 
back as the kindergarten, he is not likely ever lightly to 
change sides and go over to the party of disorder and mis- 
chief, when a crisis in the nation divides its friends and 
its foes. He has learned to drill and keep step in the 
ranks of the forces of good will. 

See now what we can do with the scholar's mind in the 
practice of as simple a study as arithmetic. We assume 
again that the teacher knows what the arithmetic is for. 
It is not merely a drill in figures. It is an exercise in 
character and the handling of facts. The indomitable 
figures are here always in the interest of truth and 
honesty. The Almighty cannot make two and two any- 
thing more or less than four. Woe unto us if the stern 



THE AMERICAN PA TRIOT. 



23 




A Lesson in Cooking. 

array of the figures is against what we wish or say ! But 
the same figures are our friends, if we go with them and 
keep on their side. They will stand by us and defend 
us. By and by we shall go out into the world; we shall 
hold offices of responsibility ; we shall have to render ac- 
counts to our fellows ; we shall have to audit the ac- 
counts of other men ; we shall have to judge of the do- 




Wood Carving. 



24 



THE AMERICAN PATRIOT. 



ings of our public servants ; we shall have to vote on 
questions of public money and credit. Will our reports be 
credited? Will our opinions do good or ill? This will 
depend upon the thoroughness of our arithmetic. When 
we were boys and girls, did we learn to go absolutely by 
the facts and the figures i 

The manual training is admirable likewise for that 
which the truthful teacher educes from it. The drawing 
cannot be inaccurate by a hair's breadth, without inac- 
curate consequences. The joints of the work must fit. 




Boys' Club, Extension Class Work. 



The world of law will not let off slovenly workmanship. 
You cannot get into a make-believe world where the error, 
the blunder, the negligence will disappear. You must 
go back and correct it, or there it remains. All this is 
moral and not only mechanical. The boy who has once 
^caught the idea will recall it, when he has to compare the 
work of rogues and honest men in the fabric of the state, 
when politicians and statesmen pass in review. He 
who knows why a bad joint can never be made to fit, 
will hardly expect a bad law to last. 



THE AMERICAN PA TRIOT. 2 5 

Let us take now the nice work of the schools in litera- 
ture and history. These studies can be made dry and 
barren in the hands of a teacher who has not learned 
what it is that has inspired the world's great literature 
and the glorious deeds of history. Noble, disinterested, 
generous and liberty-loving men and women performed 
the grand deeds. The grand deeds and the noble lives 
made the literature. The literature and the history ap- 
peal always to the chivalrous or heroic nature of their 
readers. They call upon us also to be brave, truthful* 
devoted, high-minded, enthusiastic helpers to the op- 
pressed, friendly to all, believers in the right and the good. 
We know teachers who cannot touch the great books and 
the grand deeds without making sparks of sacred fire fly, 
to kindle the hearts of their scholars with heroism. 

Questions. 

What is the test of success in good education ? 

What faults in a teacher would spoil the success of his 

school ? 
What quality do we insist upon in a teacher ? 
Describe the best teachers you ever knew. 
What object do such teachers strive for? 
What kind of bad education goes on in the homes of 

what are called " shoddy " people? 
Do you think that there is something noble in every 

child's heart? 
What does it mean " to steer one's life by the stars " ? 
What is the discipline of a school ? 
What is it for? 



THE AMERICAN PATRIOT. 



Chapter 4. 
THE HAMPTON IDEA. 

Before going into another class of subjects, I wish 
to make our idea of patriotic education perfectly plain. 
There happens to be going on in the Southern States 
of our Union a great and very interesting illustration of 
what we precisely mean by the making of patriots. 

Among the men who served in the Civil War was a 
volunteer who had come to this country from the Sand- 
wich Islands. His father, the Superintendent of Educa- 
tion in those Islands had grappled with the problem how 
to make citizens out of the native Hawaiians. The vol- 
unteer soldier rose by his intelligence and courage to the 
rank of a general. His name was Samuel C. Armstrong. 

Before the war was over, a flash of what we call inspi- 
ration came to the young general. He saw a tremen- 
dous task that lay before our nation. It was the task of 
making decent and virtuous citizens out of the mil- 
lions of the black race who had just been freed from 
slavery. They were densely ignorant ; they had the 
bad morals of savagery and slavery ; they were not used 
to any responsibility ; they had never learned to act to- 
gether like freemen ; their religion was little better than 
superstition ; and yet they were soon to be entrusted 
with a share in the great business of governing the na- 
tion. How could this mass of slaves be made into citi- 
zens ? 



THE AMERICAN PA TRIOT. 



27 



Gen, Armstrong- saw this gigantic task and he saw 
likewise the vision of a special kind of education by 
which the task could slowly be wrought out. 




GEN. S. C. ARMSTRONG. 

The great Hampton Institute near the walls ot Fortress 
Monroe in Virginia, with its thousand students, is the 
memorial of this remarkable man's life. From the close 
of the war, putting aside all chances such as his rank, 
education, connections, tireless energy and rare adminis- 
trative ability would have given him to amass wealth or 
win social and political preferment, Gen. Armstrong 
gave himself, heart and soul, to the humble but very 



2 8 THE AMERICAN PA TRIOT. 

grand work of helping the colored people to help them- 
selves, and so at least to save the land from the burden 
of their ignorance. He began with the most modest 
and meager equipment and with only a. few scholars. 

The plan of the school was that every boy and girl in 
it should earn his own living. Whoever was unwilling 
or too lazy to pay for the food that he ate, or else to 
work for it, could not come to the school. There were 
accordingly various industries provided as fast as possi- 
ble — farming and gardening, brick-making, carpentering, 
iron-working, dressmaking and other trades by which 
the few dollars a month necessary for board could be 
earned in hard work. Only the cost of tuition was given 
to those who wanted education enough to do something 
in order to earn it. Gen. Armstrong knew that no 
young person begins truly to value an education, which 
costs him nothing to get. 

Moreover, the cardinal idea of the Hampton School 
was responsibility, or in other words, that every boy and 
girl owes a debt of honor for his education. The train- 
ing of the school, the learning of trades, the normal 
department that makes teachers for hundreds of district 
schools — all this equipment is not provided in order that 
a few privileged students may learn to get their own 
living, to amass wealth, and to rise in the competition of 
life above the rest of their fellows. There is nothing 
selfish or personal in the aim of this kind of education. 
On the contrary, the whole intent is to fit boys and girls 
to help and educate others in turn. No Hampton student 
has been educated, or has caught the idea of his school, 
unless he goes out with the distinct purpose of sharing 
what he has got and passing it along for the benefit of 
his people. The vigorous self-help has a motive behind 
it. It is in order to help others, just as when in the 
early days men got the secret of Christianity, and every 
one wanted to tell his friends about it and make Christ- 
ians out of them, so these children of an oppressed race, 



THE A ME RICA N PA TRIOT. 2 9 

having got light and power and the secret of true man- 
hood, want to let all their brothers and sisters into the 
beautiful secret and so to give manhood to their race. 

This is not merely an idea. It is actually being 
worked out in bright spots all through the Southern 
country. The Hampton students go to be teachers. 
They are not content to receive their salary. They stir 
the people to build better school-houses and to provide 
school for longer terms. They start Sunday-schools and 
help make a better life around them. They build decent 
houses and give others an object lesson of what a true 
home is. They know how to work with their own hands 
and to show their neighbors how to work. They carry 
skill in the trades and new ideas of better farming. 
Where these students go they carry civilization, as though 
a light was set up in a dark place. Where they go, other 
houses are built after their model, other farms are culti- 
vated with their methods, other men and women adopt 
the new and better morals. 

One of these Hampton boys went down into Alabama 
and he started a school like Gen. Armstrong's. It has 
grown to the number of more than six hundred students, 
and it is a great new center for spreading the Hampton 
idea. 

I tell this long story because it shows what real edu- 
cation for America is. The black boy or girl who gets 
this sort of education, with a great and noble purpose in 
it to make it help others, is really getting a more thor- 
ough outfit, at less than a hundred dollars a year, than a 
Yale or Harvard or Vassar student gets at perhaps a 
thousand dollars a year, who yet looks upon education 
as a personal privilege, as a means of making money, or 
of enjoying one's self, or even like a fine dress as an orna- 
ment by which to be distinguished from more common 
people. Mr. Washington, the student who built up the 
large Alabama school, has actually got the idea of the 
broadest University Education, which many university 




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THE AMERICAN PA TRIOT 3 1 

scholars never catch at all. For this colored man sees 
that he is a citizen of a divine universe ; he is working 
on universal lines of justice and service ; he knows that 
a man is here to add the strength of his life to make 
human society more perfect and beautiful ; which un- 
fortunately many very expensively educated white college 
graduates do not see at all. 

We happen to have a capital test of what a broad and 
thorough education means. The test is, what will it 
enable its possessor to do, when he is put into a new set 
of circumstances. The true education fits a man "to 
fall on his feet " as the saying is, wherever he is thrown. 
Take away his money, send him to a strange country, 
put hardships upon him, and see what he will do. Has 
he any resources ? Can he maintain his manly dignity 
and good temper? Is he good for anything in a new 
society ? If not, he is not well educated, though he may 
read the Bible in the orignal languages. 

Now the Hampton idea of education works splendidly 
in meeting this kind of trial. We can scarcely conceive 
a spot in the universe, where a man who comes to con- 
tribute all that he knows for the good of others, is not 
welcome. There is no place where such a one will not 
be happy and at ease, or where he will not speedily fall 
into his place. 

The Hampton idea is truly the original design of the 
first college in North America. The ancient seal of 
Harvard University has the words in Latin "for Christ 
and the Church/' Those words meant that no one is 
ever educated for one's self, but education is a great trust 
and responsibility. The fact is, education is to make 
leaders in the great social army. To be educated is to 
become a helper and a leader for the sake of those who 
are not educated. For every step of promotion upwards 
a scholar takes in his school, he becomes more re- 
sponsible. W T hat will he be worth to his fellows? 
What side will he take, when the issue comes between 



32 



THE AMERICAN PATRIOT. 



those who menace the State and those who are trying to 
save it ? The colored boys and girls are getting an edu- 
cation to make them true Americans when these ques- 
tions arise. The Hampton boy is pledged to vote not 
for what he would like, but for the public good. Would 
it not be a shame if the race of the white boys and girls, 
who have the inheritance of the Mayflower and Bunker 
Hill, had run out, and did not know any longer what they 




CHURCH AND LIBRARY, HAMPTON INSTITUTE. 



were in this world for; or if they were thinking of their 
money and their pleasure, when the nation called for their 
help, their votes and their service ! 

Questions. 

Tell what you can of the story of Gen. Armstrong. 
What was the great need in the Southern country after 

the Civil War ? 
What is the danger still in the South ? 
Why are ignorant citizens dangerous to the nation ? 



THE AMERICAN PATRIOT. 



33 



What does the Hampton School require of all its students? 
Is it well for any one to get his education for nothing? 
Will the teaching a man to earn his own living be enough 

to make a good citizen of him ? 
What sort of duty did Gen. Armstrong think that an edu- 
cated person owed to others ? 
What is responsibility? 

Is a man or woman truly educated who remains selfish? 
Tell how "the Hampton idea" is spreading through the 

South. 
Name any other schools on the Hampton plan. 
How ran any one be said truly to be "a citizen of the 

Universe ? " 
What ought a well educated person to be able to do, 

when put into new or strange circumstances? 
Is there any place where a person who knows how to be 

useful and wishes to serve others, is not wanted ? 
What is the motto of the oldest college in the United 

States ? 
What does this motto really mean ? 
On what side is the true American always bound to 

stand? 
What will he do, if his private interest, his pleasure, or 

his money is on one side, and the public good is on 

the other ? 




yr. Jfifo* Qtizenship 



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THE AMERICAN PATRIOT 



Chapter 5. 



OUR LIBERTIES. 



We Americans take liberty as a matter of course. We 
forget how short a time it is since any large body of 
people have really been free. We do not have to go 
back very far in the history of our own mother-country, 
England, to find our forefathers subject to various kinds 
of oppression. The poor man could not go away from 
his own village to seek work, without the likelihood of 
being arrested and thrown into jail. No man was free to 
worship God as his own conscience required. If one of 
our ancestors had been a Baptist, or a Roman Catholic, 
he would have been taxed to support the Episcopal 
Church, and he would have been shut out from many 
privileged offices and honors open to other men. Till 
a very recent time multitudes of the English people were 
not permitted to vote, or to have any voice about the 
laws, which they were required to obey. 

The larger part of our fellow men even yet have no 
liberty, as we in America understand it. Millions of 
Poles, Greeks, Armenians and others are forced to obey 
masters of a foreign race, and to support governments 
which they detest. There are still hosts of serfs and 
slaves in the world. 

We Americans are in the habit of thinking that every- 
one must agree with our famous Declaration of Inde- 



THE AMERICAN PATRIOT 



35 



pendence, "that all men are created equal; that they are 
endowed by their Creator, with certain inalienable rights; 
that among them are life, liberty and the pursuit of hap- 
piness." The truth is, that this is rather a new idea in 
the world, except with the few great thinkers. It has 
been slow work, within the memory of many now living, 
to disabuse the minds of Americans of the idea that black 
men were not made to obey white men, and that red 
men were not made for white men to exterminate. 




Battle Ship OREGON. 

One Means for Protecting our Liberties 

Our " White Squadron " is something more than a harmless symbol of national 
power and pride. It is not a flock of doves. It means Peace, only when that is con- 
sistent with Justice and Honor. • ' ' Harsh precautions, but, unhappily, necessary 
for the well-being of the Republic. — " Uncle Sam's Church." 



Is it quite certain that all men are born equal? In 
some ways this is not true. The children of a single 
household often prove to be very unequal. So some 
races of men may be more powerful, or more intelligent, 
than certain other races. There are men, and there are 
likewise races of men, who have uncommon qualities of 
leadership. The Romans were such a race. The Anglo- 
Saxons are today such a race. The government of India 
is probably better under English rule, to which the Indian 



36 THE AMERICAN PATRIOT 

people are compelled to submit, than it ever was before, 
or than it would be, if that people tried to govern them- 
selves. 

What then do we mean, when we repeat the words of 
our noble Declaration, that ''all men are created equal"? 
We do not mean that they are all equally strong or able, 
but that they are all equally men. We mean that they are 
men, and not animals, or beasts of burden ; and that they 
must be treated and respected as men. In other words, 
men are brothers. As it is outrageous for the stronger 
brother to impose on the weaker or younger, to get the 
better of him, to snatch the good things and leave the 
other the worst things, so it is intolerable among men 
to enslave or oppress the weaker ones. As it is the part 
of the good elder brother to help lift the little one, where 
he too can see and enjoy himself, to teach him, to share 
the good things with him, so it is the part of the leaders 
of men to do their very best for their weaker brothers. 
Thus our American idea of equality is, that all men are 
to be treated on the level of their common manhood. 

There is a beautiful fact of religion in all this. When 
we treat men on the level of their manhood, it is because 
we see in them something of God or the Eternal. The 
mind, the conscience, the sympathies, the humanity in 
men is above the range of the bodily things that we see 
with our eyes, and weigh, and buy and sell. When we 
ask the question, how we like to be treated ourselves, 
or how our neighbor feels in suffering injustice or abuse, 
we are in a region where weights and measures and 
prices of merchandise do not come in. We ask such 
questions as the children of God, and because we believe 
in one Heavenly Father of us all. If we did not believe 
in God's rule of justice, if we did not see in each other 
anything more than the outside show of flesh and blood, 
we should dropdown to the physical or animal standard. 
We know that in this animal world might makes right, 
and the rule of strength is justice. In the animal world 



THE AMERICAN PATRIOT 37 

there is no law against making slaves of the weaker. It 
is in God's world of the mind, the conscience, and the 
heart, that liberty dwells. 

Many misunderstand what liberty is. They think of 
liberty under the figure of a wild animal or a bird. 
Doubtless some of the immigrants who come to America, 
from Bohemia perhaps, or from Russia, are disappointed 
to find laws and to see policemen in our free country. 
There are children who think so. When they grow up, 
they propose to do as they like. Sometimes they try a 
little experiment of this sort when the teacher goes out 
of the school room. But no school would be possible, if 
all the scholars did all the time what each liked. Neither 
would human society in a city be possible, if freedom 
meant that all the people could do as they pleased. 

What, then, is it to be free? It is not to be wild like a 
hawk. It is to be intelligent and to respect others. Thus, 
though the freest person in the United States is the Presi- 
dent, every hour of the day is occupied by the duties 
which he owes to the people. The good mother in a home 
is free, but she has to do at almost every moment what- 
ever will be best for her children. The teacher is free, but 
his freedom consists in looking after the welfare of his 
school. So that citizen is most free — not who does what- 
ever he likes, regardless of the good of others — but who 
conducts himself for the greatest good of his fellows. 

We can imagine a number of bicycle riders, each riding 
reckless of collision with the others; or we can suppose 
the riders to be careful of the rights of their companions 
on the road. Which set of riders will enjoy most freedom, 
ease, safety and swiftness of motion? 

It is evident that we are far yet from being a free peo- 
ple. We are not free merely by virtue of having the 
right to the ballot, or because we can go to and fro in the 
land. Thus, the people of the city of New York may 
vote and travel abraod, but they may still be obliged to 
pay their money to support corrupt judges, who help to 



3 8 THE AMERICAN PATRIOT 

plunder them. Again, a man may move into South Caro- 
lina and not be free to say what he thinks about politics; 
or in the same state he may have the right to vote, but if 
he is a black man, he may not be able to use his vote or 
to have it counted. 

Neither are we quite free if there are streets in our city, 
where we cannot go at night without a policeman, or if 
in some parts of our country we cannot send goods with- 
out an armed guard to defend them. Neither are we free 
if we cannot safely leave our houses for a week without 
risk of their being robbed. As the bicycle rider is not 
free to move in the company of reckless persons, so the 
citizen is deprived of some of his liberties by the ill-will, 
the injustice, the prejudices, or the recklessness of his 
fellow citizens. 

Moreover, a man even in free America cannot be quite 
free himself, if he is very poor. He may not be able on 
account of his poverty to go and seek better conditions 
elsewhere. He may really be compelled to stay in the 
city, when he would like to live in the country; his 
poverty may prevent his children from availing themselves 
of the free use of the schools. Neither can an ignorant 
man ever be quite free. He will be made to do what 
designing men wish, and to give them his vote. The 
ignorant man is also like the rider who does not under- 
stand how to manage his bicycle. He not only gets in 
the way of others, but his own movement is slow and 
cramped, and is likely to come to grief. 

The bad citizen is least of all free. For like the naughty 
boy in school, he has to be watched and policed, and 
when he does injustice, he must be arrested and perhaps 
shut up in prison. If there were as many bad citizens 
abroad, as there were in London two hundred years ago, 
or on the Rhine in the Middle Ages, no one, good or bad, 
would be free to walk the streets at night, or to travel 
without weapons to defend himself. Neither would pop- 
ular government be possible, if many bad men got into 



THE AMERICAN PATRIOT 39 

power; but some kind of a tyranny would be set up which 
would take away the liberties of all the people. Thus, 
in the old cities of Greece and Italy, the name of a re- 
public was sometimes kept, after despots had seized the 
government, and deprived the people of all real rule. 
In truth any considerable number of greedy or un- 
scrupulous persons, whether rich or poor, menace the 
liberty of all. The man or woman who wishes to live 
without working strikes at our freedom. The more peo- 
ple of that sort, the less liberty can we have. 

How shall we guard our American liberties so that we 
may not suffer their loss, like the people in the old times? 
Shall we keep our freedom by an army and big guns and 
a great navy of fast cruisers ? Or shall we prevent 
ignorant people from doing mischief by our courts and 
our jails ? Forts and armies and police never kept their 
liberties for any people, Our only safeguard for liberty 
is in the intelligence and sterling character of our people. 

Everyone knows how the teacher has to manage an 
unruly school. Such schools used to be seen in the 
country districts, where boys and girls had never learned 
discipline. They thought that they had their freedom by 
turning the teacher out of the school. Then if the 
teacher was very strong and masterful, he had to enforce 
discipline and strictness. He had to begin by reducing 
the liberties of all. The worse the school, the less could 
be the liberty for anyone. 

On the contrary, in a university there can be almost 
perfect liberty for all. Where good will and intelligence 
are, there is liberty. So then in the state, as fast as 
people become friendly and faithful, as fast as they regard 
each other's welfare and treat each other as true men — the 
children of God — our liberties grow. 

In the old days men used to fight for liberty. Now men 
who want to do something for liberty, must live the good 
life. Brave, generous, disinterested deeds, honest words, 
conscientious votes purchase the enlargement of liberty. 



4 o THE AMERICAN PATRIOT 

Questions 

How long a time has any great people enjoyed liberty? 
What sort of restrictions to their freedom did our fore- 
fathers in England suffer? What nations in the world 
to-day have such freedom as we possess? What 
nations can yon mention, who are oppressed? 

What does the Declaration of Independence say about 
men? Do men generally believe this? Do all 
Americans believe it? What do you think about it? 

Is there any doubt about the idea, that all men are created 
equal ? What is the truth in this idea ? Is it our duty 
to treat all men alike? What is our duty to them as 
men ? What is the special duty of the stronger or more 
intelligent? 

What idea of religion is behind our thought of human 
liberty? In a merely animal world, is there any duty 
towards the weak ? What constitutes real manhood ? 

What mistaken idea do some people in America have 
about freedom ? What is it to be free ? Illustrate who 
the freest persons are. 

Are we in America quite free yet? Show how many of 
our people still lack freedom. What faults of our 
fellow citizens deprive us of our freedom ? 

How does great poverty take away a man's liberty? 
How does ignorance or prejudice abridge freedom ? 
How does bad character hurt one's freedom ? Why 
was there little freedom in the Middle Ages? 

Why would it be impossible to have freedom in America, 
if many persons tried to get their living without doing 
any service in return ? 

How can we best guard our liberties ? Why is force in- 
sufficient to keep out liberties? Why is there less 
liberty in the Republic of Mexico than in the United 
States ? Why is the freedom less in a reform school 
than in a universitv? 

What can loyal Americans do for liberty to-day ? Which 
is the more important, to fight for liberty, or to live for 
liberty ? Show how human liberties may be enlarged. 








THE AMERICAN PATRIOT. 



Chapter 6. 

LAWS EQUAL FOR ALL. 

We have seen that the American idea is, Liberty for all ; 
not liberty such as wild beasts have, to do as they please 
and be eaten up by bigger beasts, but liberty to live the 
life of men. Another great idea in America is, Equal 
laws for all. 

The Old World idea has privilege. This meant that a 
few persons, or certain classes of persons, were favorites 
of the Government, as in the home of wrong-headed and 
ignorant parents, one or two of the children will some- 
times get more than their share and be treated better 
than the rest. If we could have visited France or Ger- 
many in the middle of the last century, we would have 
found a few thousand persons, rich lords and others, 
who were thus the parasites in the State. The laws were 
made for the benefit of this little minority of the nation. 
They had among themselves nearly all the offices and 
the honors and the fat salaries. They were let off easily 
from paying taxes such as others paid. Their children 
were insured places, honors and lands. These were the 
privileged class. They were the princes and kings and 
their relatives, and the groups of people who made up 
their courts. They made the laws themselves, and for 
their own benefit. Beneath them were the millions of 
the nation who had no voice in making the laws. They 



42 THE AMERICAN PATRIOT 

had to toil and pay heavy taxes, and work on the roads, 
where the rich lords rode by in their finery. The laws 
made them fight in the army and furnish their sons as 
soldiers, but they were not asked to pass an opinion 
whether the wars in which they poured out their blood 
were just or not. Thus the laws were unequal, being for 
the benefit of some and for the oppression of many. 

I am sorry to say that in these old days one of the 
privileged classes were the ministers of religion. Laws 
were made for their special benefit. For instance, there 
was a privilege known as "benefit of clergy/' which ex- 
empted a priest from being brought to trial in the courts 
like other men. The priests and bishops and monks had 
their own courts. Unworthy priests were thus enabled 
to do wrong and to escape the penalties of their crime. 
It came about at last that if a man who was not a priest 
could read, he was often given "benefit of clergy/' 
which the multitude of unlearned men could not have. 
This kind of privilege was not given because the men 
who took it were following the principles of their re- 
ligion. Jesus had never asked to be exempt from the 
burdens of the laws of the Roman Empire. But men 
took these privileges to themselves because they forgot 
Jesus' teachings, and fell into bad habits of making and 
using the laws for their own selfish ends. 

The period of privilege in the Old World has scarcely 
yet ceased. It is only a short time since it needed either 
special favor or money to buy an officer's place in the 
British army or navy. The laws were made for the ben- 
efit of the men who had property, and especially land. 
They were made for those who wanted to shoot hares 
and foxes, but not for the poor man whose garden was 
ridden over by the hunter, or whose chickens the foxes 
devoured. The old laws are hard to change even yet. 
Over in Germany and in Russia, we should still find old 
laws and customs that make one little class of people 
favorites, and compel the rest to pay for privileges that 



THE AMERICAN PATRIOT 



43 



arc to be enjoyed only by courts, officials and kings. 
The great men who brought out our American plan of 
government thought justice the greatest thing in the 
world. They were determined to have no favorites here, 
and no class of men who should enjoy privileges that 
other men must pay for. They would not let any Amer- 
ican set up a title of nobility, as though he and his fam- 
ily were made of different clay from the rest of us. 
Washington, Franklin, Jefferson, Adams, and their friends, 

The French Castle Chateau du Moutier. 




PRIVILEGES THAT OTHER MEN MUST PAY FOR. 



the ablest, the most intelligent, the most prosperous men 
of their time, held that the same laws which were best 
for the people, were best also for them. They scorned to 
ask any privileges for themselves. 

It is hard for us to-day to realize what a great step in 
advance this idea of Equal laws for all, was. We have 
all become used to it, and accept it like an axiom in 



44 THE AMERICAN PATRIOT 

geometry. The officers of the government do not plan, 
as officers of the government once planned and plotted, 
to hand down their offices to their own sons, and to 
make their salaries hereditary. The men in Congress 
and the Legislatures do not dream that they have any 
right to frame laws for one class of the people and not 
for all. The ministers of religion, to-day, do not ask the 
government to grant special privileges for their sake. 
What is good for the others is good, they think, for them. 

A great and beautiful thing follows from our American 
idea of equal laws. It appears that our way is vastly 
better, not only for the great multitude of the people, but 
it is better also for the rich, and for the government of- 
ficials, and for the educated, and for the ministers of 
religion. We know what happens in the body whenever 
there is a rush of blood to the head or to the stomach. 
The extremities are cold and fail to be nourished, and in- 
flammation sets in, perhaps, to the destruction of the 
brain or the stomach, where the excess of blood is con- 
gested. What is needed for the thorough health of the 
body is even and regular circulation of the blood. Every 
part must be fed and warmed ; each little cell and tissue 
must have its share. And when the whole body is not 
thus equally supplied, the great central organs soon 
suffer. 

It is so in human society and in the State ; it is so in 
the family. It is not only not good and fair to the others 
to treat a few with favoritism ; it is very dangerous to 
the favorites. It was dangerous to Joseph in the old 
Bible story, that his father treated him better than the 
others. This tempted him to be conceited and to tell his 
dreams to his father and mother, and it tempted the 
other brothers to hate him. It was dangerous in old 
France to be a nobleman and to have privileges. Men 
and women became vain, idle and selfish. The noble- 
man's children were spoiled. The poor, who had to pay 
the taxes in order to support the grand court, came to 



THE AMERICAN PATRIOT 45 

hate the privileged people. The terrible Revolution 
came and the unjust laws were swept away in a river of 
blood. 

On the other hand our equal laws serve to keep the 
body politic healthy and well nourished. Our laws aim 
to give justice to the poor on even terms with the rich. 
Our courts are open to all alike. The laws provide that 
all shall be taxed on the same scale. If the laws wish to 
spread prosperity among all, the whole land is richer and 
all are the more contented. If all could be well fed, 
comfortable and happy, the leaders of the people, the 
richer people, 'the better educated, the ministers of re- 
ligion, the government officers and the legislators would 
then be really succeeding in accomplishing the ends for 
which leaders exist. As when the officers of an army see 
to it that all their men are well provided for, clothed, 
equipped and fed, it is so much the better for the officers 
and the staff, who are the more likely to lead the army 
to victory. Whereas, a Chinese army in which the 
officers look out for themselves and let the soldiers 
starve, at last brings officers and all to ruin. 

I have said that our laws aim to be equal for all. This 
is our American theory. I have not said that we have 
quite succeeded in getting equal laws. The fact is, 
when for many centuries things have been wrong, it is 
not easy at once to make them right by our votes. The 
habit of privilege or of unequal laws is like a chronic 
disease — rheumatism, for instance. The man still limps 
after you begin to cure him. So the old customs and 
laws that were made by property holders for themselves, 
are not got out of the minds of our Anglo-Saxon race 
simply because our fathers have written the words of 
our noble Constitution and our Bill of Rights. We fear 
that selfish men still often go on trying after the old way 
to use the laws and the courts, and even to contrive to 
pass new laws for the interest of their own business, for 
their own special protection, for their own party or sec- 



4 6 THE AMERICAN PA TRIOT 

lion. We have heard of laws even in America that were 
not framed for the good of all the people. We have 
heard of taxes that seemed not to bear very fairly on the 
shoulders of all. Nevertheless we have learned the 
American idea. If men ever use the laws wrongly, or 
slightingly, or as partisans, for the sake of the North, 
the South, the East, or the West, we know that this is a 
kind of treason to our common flag. If our legislators 
ever do these things, we know that they ought not to 
stay in the Legislature any longer. We will call them 
home and send men who will serve the people, and the 
whole people. 

Questions. 

What is our American idea about liberty ? What is our 
idea about the laws ? 

What was the Old World idea in making laws ? What 
sort of favoritism prevailed in France or Germany? 

Illustrate how this favoritism worked. Who bore its 
burdens ? 

What was " benefit of clergy " ? What do you think that 
Jesus would have said about this ? Show in what 
ways the period of " privilege" still lasts. 

Who were the men who made our American govern- 
ment ? What did they aim to effect ? Why is it 
wrong to get privileges for one's self that the laws do 

not give to all ? 

What harm do unequal laws do to the few who seem to 
profit by them? How does French history illustrate 
this ? How do our equal laws really serve the rich 
better than laws specially made for their benefit ? 

?how any respects wherein we have not made our laws 
equal for all ? 

What remedy have we, if our legislators make selfish, or 
sectional, or partisan laws ? 



Qtizenship 





(^^ 



THE AMERICAN PATRIOT 



Chapter 7. 
RIGHTS AND DUTIES 

The Americans, as we have seen, are a good people 
for getting their rights. They do not propose to let any- 
one have honors, powers or privileges which all the rest 
cannot have also on equal terms. They are accustomed 
to tell the children in their common schools that the 
highest offices in the land, the governorship, the supreme 
court and the presidency, are within the reach of the 
sons of the poorest. Whereas, in the old times, a very few 
men were entitled to be called lords or masters, and even 
in the earlier days of our own country only the wealthy 
or better educated were allowed to use a title, it has 
become a custom now to prefix the sign "Mr.," the 
abbreviation of " master," before the name of the hum- 
blest citizen of the republic, and the corresponding title of 
" Mrs.," or "Mistress," before the name of his wife. 
This democratic custom stands for the fact, that in Amer- 
ica every man thinks that he has rights equal to every 
other man. The equal laws are intended to secure him 
in these equal rights. 

There is another side to all this urgent insistence about 
our rights. If it is a good American idea that we are all 
bound to get our rights, it ought to be an equally good 
American idea that we all have our duties too. This is 
the reverse side of the same shield. We may express it 



4 8 THE AMERICAN PA TRIOT 

in this way, namely, that every right carries with it a 
corresponding duty. 

The fact is, there are two opposite ways of getting our 
rights in this world. One way is by force, as when the 
strong man helps himself to whatever he thinks is his — 
yes, and very often helps himself to what belongs to the 
others. The other way to get rights is by helping one 
another. This is true human society. It means that 
everyone gets his own rights by seeing to it that the 
others have their rights. For how can anyone in the 
crowd of men get what is his due unless all with one 




The Way that was found necessary in 1776 for obtaining our Rights 
A more humane Way is by extending the Principles of fhe Patriotic League 

consent help one another. This is what the great Chi- 
nese teacher, Confucius, called reciprocity. It is what 
Jesus meant when he gave us the Golden Rule. You 
want your rights : " Very well! " Jesus says, See then 
that your neighbors get their rights. Your rights are 
the others' duties; your duties are the others' rights. 
The right on either side translates into a duty on the 
other side. Whoever wants his own rights without 
being willing to do his corresponding duties in return, 
has the spirit of the thief. He wants to have the use of 
the laws, but he does not wish to keep them himself. 
All this is very hard for many persons to learn. The 



THE AMERICAN PA TRIOT 49 

truth is, that they are greedy about their rights; they can 
scarcely see how they will get their rights unless they 
assert them and claim them. They are unwilling to trust 
that if they do their part and look out for the rights of 
others, in other words, attend to their duties, others will 
give them their rights. They remind us of children who 
have been brought up with bad table manners. They 
have been accustomed to help themselves and to hurry 
and snatch in fear lest the others shall get more than their 
share. When these children first see a decent and civ- 
ilized table where everyone waits his turn and each is 
quick to serve the other, they do not know how to 
behave. Nevertheless this is the only kind of table 
where everyone is sure to be supplied. So, precisely, in 
our democratic form of government; if we want our 
rights the only way to get them is to see, as we do at 
the table, that everyone else is served too. In other 
words, in our free and equal American government, for 
the very reason that we insist upon larger private rights 
for each individual, we have to say more about public 
duties and public spirit than anywhere else in the world. 

I have said that every right carries with it a duty. Let 
me illustrate how this is so. Here the freeman has a 
right to vote equally with every man. But wheri this 
has been said, only a half, and that the less important 
half is said. To vote is not so much a right as a duty. 
We vote not merely in order to get and to defend our 
own, but also that we may each see to it, in the language 
of the old Roman orator, "that the republic suffer no 
harm." 

So also I have a right to the use of the streets, the 
police, the courts, the fire department, the parks and the 
public library. Suppose now that I had my rights, and 
even more, that I was able by my influence to procure it 
the public expense a sidewalk and a street lamp before 
my fellow-citizens generally could enjoy these privileges. 
Suppose that I was sure of justice, while others, poorer 



50 THE AMERICAN PATRIOT 

than I was, did not always obtain justice; could I be con- 
tent with getting my rights ? On the contrary, I am 
responsible for the mischief, if any of my neighbors fail 
of their full right also. Whatever I enjoy at the public 
expense I am bound to help the others to enjoy. 

Or, take the case of the public offices. I have a right 
to be eligible to office, but this is only half of the truth. 
I have also a duty if the State needs me to serve in an 
office. 1 must be able to show good reason for declining 
to serve. But perhaps I want office. I have a right, I 
claim, to the office, its honors and its salary. There is, 
however, a more important question. The question is, 
whether it is my duty to seek the office. It may be my 
duty to decline it. The office is not for me, but for the 
sake of the public. I have, therefore, really no right 
or claim to an office unless I am fitted for it, and unless 
I take it to serve the State. 

I have touched, merely for the purpose of illustration, 
upon very important subjects, which demand fuller 
explanation elsewhere. My point here merely is to urge 
that there is nowhere a right which does not prove, when 
turned around, to have a duty on the other side of it. 

There is a profound reason why this is so. We live in 
a universe. This means that everything is bound up in 
close ties with everything else, and every person with 
all other persons. In a strict sense we are all " rela- 
tions/' In the outward world you cannot strip the for- 
ests from the hills and not hurt the farmers and the 
millers who live beyond the hills. So in the world of 
men, you cannot build up or burn down a single village 
without affecting also the nation for good or evil. If in 
the South, or on the frontier, or in the city of New York, 
there are men who go without their rights, it is as 
though there were disease or a sore place in the body. 
That sore place must be cured or the whole body will 
suffer. For each little cell in the body is not there merely 
to exist, to thrive and to draw sustenance for itself; it 



THE A ME RICA N PA TRIOT. 5 r 

exists and has its right to be nourished for what it is 
worth to its neighbors and to the whole body also. 

This is not all. We do not live merely in a universe. 
It is a growing universe. Old things, outworn customs, 
inadequate laws, all pass away and give place in each 
age to better customs, more just laws, more free insti- 
tutions. If this is so, men have to grow better likewise. 
The world has no use for the kind of savage men who 
once flourished by the rule of force. Thus our American 
Indian must become civilized or else disappear; the world 
is becoming tired of the men who crowd around the table 
of life, snatching the good things each for himself. Such 
men have had their day in the growing universe, which 
sloughs off the things which it outgrows. The world now 
asks for a higher order of men. America, at least, must 
have this higher life in order to match her higher insti- 
tutions, her equal laws and her liberties. Enough has 
already been said by men who demand their rights. The 
city, the state and the nation now ask for men who will 
talk about their duties and insist upon doing their duties. 
The idea might once have been, " Our rights first, and 
let other men do their duties." The new idea is, " Our 
duties first, and our rights will come the more surely." 

The learned men tell us that the earth, ages ago, was 
tenanted with immense, ugly, awkward, stupid creatures 
that lived in the slime. But at last in the process of time 
the mammals appeared, superior, with better brains, 
smaller perhaps, but more powerful, and the great sau- 
rians disappeared. The world had no more use for them 
except as specimens in a museum. And then later, man 
came and the day passed away for all noxious beasts. 
More and more the animals must serve and help man or 
vanish before him. The gentle ox, the intelligent horse, 
the friendly dog, the useful sheep, the beautiful birds of 
the air, might remain; but the days of the bear, the wolf 
and the tiger were numbered; only the higher and help- 
ful thing could stay. The creature which tried to live for 



52 THE AMERICAN PATRIOT 

itself alone was not wanted any longer in the growing 
and divine universe. 

So it is with the different orders and types of men. The 
injurious, the grasping, the selfish have their day like the 
ancient creatures of the slime. The new age is already here. 
The new call which America is making is for the men and 
women who are here for their duties, not for their own 
rights alone, but that all may have equal rights.. 

Questions 

What is it that Americans are urged to get ? Show how 
this is. 

What is the reverse side to the subject of "rights ?" What 
was the old way of getting rights ? What better way 
is there to get our rights ? What famous Chinaman 
taught this idea? What did Jesus teach about it? 
Why do many persons fail to understand Jesus' idea ? 
Show the advantage of good table manners over bad 
manners. What is the idea of the civilized table man- 
ners ? In what kind of government do people get their 
rights most fully? In what kind of government do we 
have to say most about the duties of the people ? 

Show how the right of voting carries a duty with it. 
What is the right of voting for? 

What duty does the more influential citizen who can get 
his rights owe to his humbler fellow-citizens ? 

Would you call office-holding a right or a duty ? Has 
any one a right to an office which he is not well-fitted 
to fill ? If not, why ? 

What does it mean when we say that we live in a 
" universe " ? Illustrate how we are all related. 

Show how harm comes to all of us when even a few 
persons fail of their rights. What are the little cells in 
the body for ? 

What do we mean by saying that the world grows? 
What becomes of the things that the world has out- 
grown ? Why must our Indians become civilized if 
they wish to live ? Is this fair? 

What order of men do our American institutions demand? 
What idea matches with our institutions ? 

Tell about the ancient creatures of the slime. What kind 
of animals are now permitted to remain? What kind 
of men are like the ancient creatures ? 




AMERICAN PATRIOT 



Chapter 8. 
THE BUSINESS OF RULERS 

Our American system of government makes all the 
people rulers.* For the sake of convenience they dele- 
gate their power to those whom they choose to serve 
them as representatives and other officers. Queen 
Victoria or the Emperor of Germany may have ministers 
or governors who shall hold and use the royal authority. 
But as the Emperor also takes back the power that he 
has delegated and names other governors or generals, so 
the people in the United States at every election take 
back their power into their own hands and make fresh 
appointments. Their President and Representatives 
may carry out the wisest policy that they can devise and 
may make laws for the time, but the people always hold 
the power to change the policy of the government and 
to require their representatives to make new and different 
laws. It is the people, therefore, who are the rulers, 
while the officers of government are the ministers of the 
people. 

This is a very remarkable experiment. The world has 
not yet ceased to wonder how it can be possible to make 
all the people rulers. Doubters still shake their heads 
and say that our experiment will not work. They tell 

* In most of our States the suffrage is limited to the men. But this limitation is 
obviously the survival of an Old-World custom in the treatment of women. It is not 
in line with the general ideas of government in America, and there are many indica- 
tions of coming change in this direction of the removal of the arbitrary barrier which 
has shut out women from full citizenship. 



54 THE AMERICAN PATRIOT 

us that we have so far only begun to try it. "In the 
main," they say, "your government has really been car- 
ried on by the wiser few, by those who own property, 
who have succeeded in keeping the power and in 
framing the laws. The people have generally allowed 
the few to manage for them. But when the many have 
become the rulers, as in New York City, see how near 
they have come to wrecking the government! Wait till 
the multitude take the power into their own hands and 
make the laws themselves, and see what will become of 
your American institutions." 

There are many answers to this gloomy prophecy of 
those who do not believe in the people, but it is no use 
to deny that there is actual danger in this direction. 
Other governments have broken down. History is the 
story about their rise and fall. Who shall secure us that 
our own government can stand firm through the thou- 
sands of coming years ? Indeed it is largely our faith in 
human progress, which is another name for our faith in 
God, that enables us to believe that we have got a secret, 
such as earlier men did not possess, for keeping our 
government. 

We have already agreed that we have got a new idea 
of patriotism in America. The patriot with us is not the 
man who will fight for his king or his class or his own 
home, but he stands for the rights of all classes and to 
defend all homes, even of his poorest brothers.* We 
have agreed also that a good citizen has something more 
to do than to look after his own rights. He has duties 
along with his rights, and the only effective way to get 
his rights is to do his duties, which are his neighbors' 
rights. 

All this becomes even clearer as soon as a man, in 
addition to being a mere citizen, takes the office of a 
ruler. The first business of a ruler is to look after the 
interests of the whole Country. He is a ruler for the 

* Of course the very best and noblest men in former days had this idea of the pa- 
triot. We mean this; this idea is now coming to be popular. 



THE AMERICAN PA TRIOT. 5 5 

sake of the millions of others. This was seen by the 
men of the old times. When the ruler was the man, the 
king, they judged him a good or a bad king, according 
as he watched and defended the interests of his people. 

The story is told that when the great Charlemagne 
saw the fleet of the piratical Northmen off his coasts, he 
wept in sorrow for the days to come when he could no 
longer beat the pirates off. The famous Emperor Marcus 
Aurelius had lived altogether for his empire. He had 
shortened his own life in the camps by the side of the 
Danube. Even ambitious and tyrannical rulers, Alex- 
ander, Caesar, Napoleon, had to pretend, and perhaps 
even believed themselves, that they were fighting for 
their people, for Greece, for Rome, for France. 

The same was true when in old England the govern- 
ment was really in the hands of a little group of great 
noblemen, the Whig lords. These men had to persuade 
themselves that they were ruling for the sake of England. 
They knew that they had no semblance of right to be 
spending the money and the blood of the people for 
themselves. For everywhere the world has long ago 
found out that a ruler's whole business is the welfare of 
the people. And when a ruler, like the terrible Borgias 
in Italy, or the Sultan in Turkey to-day, rules for himself, 
he is a despot and a traitor. 

Now this principle is just as true when the rulers are 
many as when there was only one. It holds good for 
every citizen-king of the United States as for the Emperor 
William. The Emperor William would be a bad ruler 
and a traitor to his people, when in any question that 
arose concerning the welfare of his people, he decided for 
his own selfish pleasure or his pride, and against the 
people; so when a question concerns the welfare of the 
American people, and any of .them chooses merely for 
himself and lets the welfare of the people suffer, this 
citizen-ruler is as bad as the selfish, stubborn or proud 
king, who misuses his power. 



56 THE AMERICAN PATRIOT 

Let us make this point very clear. From time to time 
the millions of our American rulers have to choose what 
the policy of the government shall be in the difficult 
questions of Free Trade or Protection. I have nothing to 
say here as to the respective merits of these opposite 
sides. What I have to say is, that it is the business of 
the rulers to look out for the welfare of the whole people. 
The question for a bad ruler might indeed seem to be, 
" Which side shall be for my own interest ?" But the 
question for a good ruler is, ''What will most benefit 
the Country ? " And what will benefit it, not only for 
to-day, but for the future also. We have all admitted 
that a man ought to ask this as a patriot, and as a ruler 
this is a man's chief business to ask. 

Suppose now that some man thinks that the policy of 
a high tariff will help him to make money, and he never 
takes any pains to find out what will be the effect of this 
policy upon the people in other kinds of business or upon 
the farmers. Or suppose that a man on the other side 
merely hopes that the policy of Free Trade will help him 
buy his coats and his books cheaper, and he does not 
care what happens to manufacturers or miners; men, in 
their way, are doing the same sort of thing which our 
forefathers beheaded King Charles for doing. King 
Charles used the power to get his own selfish will; and 
that is substantially what selfish rulers are always trying 
to do. 

I make this point about the bounden duty of our citi- 
zen rulers more emphatic because many persons do not 
recognize it at all. They know that it is true for a mon- 
archy, but they have not opened their eyes to see that it 
is true in a republic. They seem to think that the duty 
of a citizen-ruler is only to choose whatever seems to be 
for his own interest. They imagine that what is good 
for all of us will thus grow out of a conflict of all sorts of 
opposing selfishnesses. With these persons the position 
of the ruler in a republic is a sort of a tug-of-war team, 



77/A' AMERIC. I .V PA TRIO T 5 7 

where each side pulls as hard as it can against the 
opposite side. 

One might as well say that jurors, when they decide a 
case of justice, were chosen to pull against each other in 
a self-willed tug-of-war. As the jurors sit for justice, so 
the ruler in every case is, as it were, under oath to regard 
the general welfare. What should we think of a group 
of citizens who, if they became sufficiently numerous, 
used their power to get places and offices for themselves, 
or to tax the rest of the people for their own benefit! 
But this is what everv citizen-ruler is willing to do who 
chooses the policy of the government with an eye merely 
to his own advantage. 

All this is clearer yet when we make one of our citizen- 
rulers a delegate in behalf of the rest in the city Council, 
the Legislature, the Congress, or in any other office. 
Now he becomes doubly responsible. He is ruler in his 
own right, and as such bound in honor to act for the 
good of all, and he is also specially chosen to act for 
others. He is doubly a traitor too if he is planning to 
get something for himself by the use of his power. The 
one thing that he sits in office for is the good of the 
people. What shall we think of him if he sits there in 
order to benefit his own business or to make money 
faster than other men, or to distribute offices to his rela- 
tions! This man is either very bad or he has not got the 
kindergarten ideas of an American citizen. 

But some one asks, "Is not the man in office to help 
his party ? " What is his party for, we reply. Is it for 
plunder or for the few and not for the many ? What 
right has a man to belong to any party which is not 
seeking the interests of the people ? 

One thing more; it is an ancient truth, that in order to 
learn how to rule we must first learn how to obey. This 
was in the famous motto of the Black Prince, " Ich 
dien," I serve. This has been the thought of the great 
and good rulers. There was not one of them who was 



5 8 THE AMERICAN PA TRIOT 

merely a ruler to command. They obeyed while they 
ruled. They obeyed the laws themselves and therefore 
they enforced them. They obeyed the voice of justice, 
which is the voice of God in their own hearts. They 
obeyed the promptings of their humanity. This is our 
American idea for our millions of citizen-rulers. They 
are good for nothing to rule unless they obey. Show 
them what is right and they will pour out treasure and 
life to fulfill it. If our people get this thought, our 
Country can never perish. 

Questions 

Who are the rulers in America ? Show how their rep- 
resentatives get their power. 

Why do we call the American idea an "experiment"? 
What do some say in opposition to it ? Why do you 
think that our experiment will succeed ? 

What did we agree in Chapter I. as to the American idea 
of a patriot ? What have we agreed was the way to 
get our rights ? 

What is the main business of a king ? Give instances of 
good kings. What is the real business of the rulers in 
an aristocracy ? What do we call rulers who only 
rule for themselves ? Do we change the principle 
when we in America make all the citizens rulers ? 
Illustrate what the citizen-ruler is for in deciding the 
policy of the government. 

What mistaken idea do many persons still have about 
our rulers in America ? 

What double responsibility rests upon our Representa- 
tives and other officers ? What are they in office for ? 

Is a man in office to help his party ? What is the only 
use of a party ? 

What was the motto of the Black Prince ? What does 
the motto mean ? Show how great rulers have had to 
obey. What idea will make our Country secure? 



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THE AMERICAN PATRIOT 



Chapter 9. 
WHO THE PRIVILEGED CLASS IS IN AMERICA 

We have seen that there were "privileged" people in 
the old world. They were those who owned great 
tracts of land; or whose fathers had been princes, or the 
friends of kings, or mighty soldiers. Such as these, 
having inherited wealth or a noble name, enjoyed priv- 
ileges apart from other men. Thus, in Germany, the 
army officers have had to be "gentlemen," that is, men 
of " good families," and not the sons of the peasantry or 
the poor. The privileged class have held themselves to 
be of finer clay than other people. They have often 
fenced themselves about so as not to let the "lower 
classes" enter their charmed circle. They have tried to 
forbid their sons and daughters from marriage out of their 
own rank. 

It must frankly be admitted that there are differences 
of power and position in America. There are some dif- 
ferences which ought not to be. There are families 
who think themselves better than others merely on ac- 
count of their name, or of some illustrious grandfather. 
There are those who imagine that the mere fact of having 
money raises them into a kind of noble rank. We have 
not kept all the snobs on the opposite side of the Atlantic. 

There is a dangerous kind of privilege which we have 
let some unprincipled persons get for themselves, when 
we have suffered selfish men to manage politics, to name 



60 THE AMERICAN PATRIOT 

themselves or their friends for office, and thus to control 
our government for their own ends. This has been a 
sort of privilege like that of the old world, which one 
man enjoys and others have to pay for. When a Senator 
or a Representative in Congress hac thought himself to 
have the right to fill certain offices in his State or district, 
this was exactly the same as when a nobleman of France 
or England in the old times exercised the privilege of 
drawing pay or pensions for his own relatives from the 
treasury of the realm. 

There are, however, real and honest privileges which 
some men may enjoy and others may not deserve. 
There are such privileges in a school when the older and 
more intelligent scholars may have a freedom, for in- 
stance, of communication with one another, of going to 
the library for books, or of discussing with the teacher in 
the class room, such as could not be permitted to young 
pupils. It is indeed true, as we have seen, that the laws 
of the state must be the same for all. But there are 
actual differences between men in a republic as truly as 
in a monarchy. The common laws do not level away 
these differences. There are therefore natural differences 
in the power, the influence and the position which men 
reach. There are those who have distinct advantages 
even in America, and they make our privileged class. 
Let us see what constitutes " privilege" with us, and let 
us discover whether there is not a good meaning in the 
word. 

In the first place, skill of any sort gives advantage or 
privilege to its possessor. This has always been true in 
some degree, but in the old world the man of skill, if he 
happened to be poor, was sadly cramped in the natural 
enjoyment of his skill. He might be a slave; then all his 
earnings would be taken away from him. The man of 
skill must give way to the man of the sword. In 
America we have changed this. The abolition of slavery 
lifted the last curse that had once been put upon labor. 



THE AMERICAN PA TRIOT 6 1 

More and more the demand is for skilled men. The 
great corporations cannot find enough of them. The 
land is full of stories of the rise of such men from poverty 
to high positions. Edison is only one of a growing 
number of honorable names of our privileged class of the 
skilful. 

A thorough education also confers natural privileges. 
It may or may not be a college education. It may be the 
education of the " University of the World," through the 
costly discipline of experience. We mean the sort of 
education that fits the mind to do any task, or to fill any 
position to which it may be assigned. We mean the 
power of careful, honest, sustained thought. We mean 
if any question arises, public or private, the precious 
habit of candor, fairness, deliberation, freedom from prej- 
udice. Here, for example, is the question about the 
Monroe Doctrine and the duty of the United States con- 
cerning the governments of South America. It is edu- 
cation that counts, whether in the White House or in 
Congress, or in ten thousand newspaper offices through 
the Country. Half educated men may make speeches 
and write articles and indeed stir up a great noise. But 
the men and women of real education have the advantage 
in the long run. What intelligence, justice and sound 
sense determine must come to prevail. 

The frugal and virtuous are also a privileged class in 
America. Jhere have been times when everything 
seemed to be against the plain and frugal people. The 
king taxed them; the nobles lorded it over them; the 
soldiers plundered them. There are parts of Turkey now 
where the frugal and virtuous seem to be at a disadvan- 
tage by the side of robbers. There may be exceptional 
cases in the factory towns or the mining camps of our 
Country, where the virtuous poor have to suffer. But 
the rule in the United States is altogether the other way. 
The rule is, that the frugal, industrious, honest, temper- 
ate families are rising from the ranks. They come from 



62 THE AMERICAN PA TRIOT 

Canada, Ireland, Italy, Germany. They are trusted 
everywhere. They pay as they go; they do not run into 
debt; they begin to save. Presently they own houses, 
shops or farms. They send their children to school; it 
may be to college. They found families. In other 
words, the family tree, rooted in thrift and virtue, grows 
tall and fine. There is no more respectable tree in 
America, so long as it grows out of the old stalwart root 
of virtue. Tell any employer or any constituency, that a 
man has come of one of these thrifty, honest families, and 
you have established a prestige for his success. 

It also begins to be discovered that friendliness, or 
good temper, constitutes privilege. The old idea of a 
lord or a king was of a fierce, arrogant, insolent man. 
We do not want such men in America anywhere. We 
do not even want them as soldiers or policemen. Give 
us men who are kindly, courteous and obliging. Give 
us men who like to do favors, who are considerate of 
others' feelings. We want such men as our overseers in 
'factories, superintendents on railroads, and directors of 
corporations. We are finding that these are the only 
kind of employers or officers who are decent or fit to 
handle forces of men, or to carry on public business. 
The friendly men are thus coming to be privileged men. 
They are the coming race ! 

I have already hinted wherein " privilege" in America 
consists. It is not in being let off from what others have 
to do or pay. It is not in having honors or places which 
one's grandfather has handed down. It is the fair and 
just privilege of power, influence and leadership. It is 
the privilege of serving the public, it may be without 
pay, more than others are able to serve. My rich neigh- 
bor has risen by his simple skill from a poor boy. He 
throws but one vote. But his influence in the town is 
worth a hundred votes. He never went to college, but 
people believe in his good judgment, and when he rises 
to speak, everyone listens and goes home to think about 



THE AMERICAN PA TRIOT 6 3 

what he said. What is more, they believe in his manli- 
ness and sincerity. He says exactly what he thinks. 
They know that he is public-spirited and that he will 
give his money along with his influence to benefit the 
city. They may or may not ever send him to Congress. 
But this neighbor of mine is a privileged character in the 
city. He counts for a thousand such men as I see hang- 
ing around the doors of the saloons. Yes, he would 
count for hundreds of some rich men, such as I know, 
foolish, idle fellows, if he had no wealth, but was only 
plain John Smith, so long as he kept his skill, his intelli- 
gence, his integrity and his large-hearted friendliness. 

There is one favorite American idea that needs to be 
stated about our privileged class. We hold that there 
ought to be freedom of opportunity to get into this class. 
The trouble with the old-fashioned kind of "gentlemen" 
was, that they did not care to have all the boys become 
gentlemen like themselves. They meant to have a class 
beneath them. We say the opposite in America. We 
aim to give every boy and girl a good clear chance to get 
up into the rank of our ladies and gentlemen. Our rank 
includes all those who have the feelings of true ladies and 
gentlemen. It is based on skill, intelligence, character 
and a kind heart. We do not think that the way is yet 
open for all our millions of children in America into this 
higher rank. There are children whose homes are not 
good enough to give them an even chance with others. 
There are parents whose wages are not sufficient to 
allow their children the splendid opportunities of our 
public schools. There are too many saloons where ig- 
norant people waste their earnings, and their children 
suffer. Nevertheless the great American idea grows : 
Give every child his fair chance! 

Questions 

What is " privilege" ? Who were the privileged people 
in the old world? Is there such a thing as "finer 



64 THE AMERICAN PA TRIOT 

clay " in human nature ? Are there real differences 
between men ? If so, what kind of differences are 
there ? Ought a man to be respected for his family 
name? Give reasons. What bad privileges exist in 
America ? 

Give examples of skilful men or women and of what 
they have accomplished. What advantage have such 
men in America ? 

What is your idea of a thorough education ? What will 
it do for anyone ? Do you think that educated men 
and women get credit for as much as they deserve ? 

What is property? Is it always possible for frugal and 
industrious people to " get ahead " in America ? What 
is the general rule? Can you give instances to illus- 
trate your answer ? What faults prevent great num- 
bers of people from getting any influence ? 

What has friendliness to do with getting on in the 
world ? Is it a good reason for being friendly, that you 
will get on better so? What better reason can you 
give ? 

What is the difference between old world privilege and 
such privilege as we allow in America ? Show how it 
is a privilege to be able to save and help others. What 
privilege did Gen. Grant or Lincoln enjoy ? 

How can one man often " count '"' for more than others ? 
Who counts for the most? Who counts for the least ? 

What favorite idea have we in America about an equal 
opportunity for all ? Where do children fail of a fair 
chance ? What do we need to do to set all the chil- 
dren right? What is the highest idea of a gentleman 
and a lady ? 

Lenity will operate with greater force, in some in- 
stances, than rigor. It is, therefore, my first wish, to have 
my whole conduct distinguished by it. — Washington. 




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THE AMERICAN PATRIOT 

Chapter io. 
THE MAJORITY 

WE SAY in America that the people rule, or that the 
people are the kings. There was one glorious 
moment in our history when this seemed a simple 
thing. It was immediately after we had agreed to accept 
the new Constitution, and all the young Nation, with 
one consent, wished George Washington to be their 
President. But our people at once began to divide into 
parties, and after Washington's time they could never 
agree again to desire any one man as their President. 
Even in a town it is a rare event when all the people 
want the same mayor or Board of Selectmen. In fact, 
hardly any subject can be proposed to the people against 
which some have not objections. What shall we do 
when we have millions of voters and they will not agree ? 
In the old times, for instance among a tribe of savages, 
they would often settle such a difficulty by fighting. 
Thus might made right. Long before men were civilized, 
however, they had learned to "count heads," or to vote, 
and they found that this was a better way for settling 
their differences of opinion than to fight. In America, 
the appeal to the ballot is the one, great, established way 
by which we do all the political business of the Nation. 
We have made it a sort of motto of our Government — 
The majority shall rule. The Civil War made that mot- 
to more solid than ever. For when a part of the Nation 



66 THE AMERICAN PATRIOT 

brought upon us the old, barbarous "trial by battle," and 
thousands of millions of money were destroyed, and 
hundreds of thousands of lives were sacrificed, it was 
burned into our National memory forever, we trust, 
that we must settle our differences like civilized men by 
our arguments and our votes, and not like savages, by 
killing each other. 

Is it not a rude way, however, to count hands or 
heads, and then to let the majority rule ? Suppose that 
the majority of the voters are ignorant, while the more 
intelligent people are on the other side. Suppose we 
lived in Mexico, and the vast majority of the people could 
not even read their votes. Suppose the majority are in 
the wrong. Suppose that they are in favor of an unjust 
institution like slavery, or that they wish to engage the 
• whole nation in a shameful war. Suppose in the town, 
that the majority favor the liquor business and will not 
even restrict it; or that they propose to levy taxes upon 
all the people for hurtful expenditures; or that they will 
not vote to support good schools. Is it fair that a major- 
ity shall rule when that majority is not worthy of the 
power? By what rule of justice must the majority rule 
in such cases as these ? 

It must be owned that our standard American motto is 
a rude method after all. It is better and more humane 
than fighting, but it often resembles fighting, in so far as 
mere numbers, as in an army, are set over against other 
numbers. To show that a larger number of citizens 
desire a certain man for President surely does not prove 
him to be a fit man for that high office. To show that a 
majority of men prefer a tariff does not prove anything as 
to the wisdom or justice of a tariff. In fact, it has fre- 
quently happened that the vast majority of men at a 
given time have been wrong, and only a few individuals 
have been right. How would Socrates or Jesus have 
been put to death, if majorities could be trusted ? A 
strong case could be made from human history, that 



THE A ME RICA N PATRIOT 67 

with regard to all reforms and changes of custom the 
majorities have always begun by being in the wrong. 

It seems therefore, at first, as if we might hit upon 
some better pkm than to let the majority rule. The truth 
is, that the wise, the fair-minded, the honest and right- 
eous, if we could only find them, ought to steer the Ship 
of State. Why should not the wise and the virtuous, 
the educated and the public-spirited have more weight 
and more votes than the selfish and the ignorant ? ' Why 
should not the man also who has property at stake, as 
well as his life, have more votes than the tramp who has 
not, perhaps, learned the language of our Country? 

Many persons are saying such things as these in Amer- 
ica. They think that a considerable number of the 
voters are too ignorant to be allowed to vote at all. 
They say that we have made a serious mistake in allow- 
ing the majority to rule. They believe that the power 
ought to be in the hands of such men as themselves, 
graduates of high-schools and colleges, owners of prop- 
erty, officers and members of churches. They imagine 
that the Country would be for better governed if a 
minority ruled. In some States in the Union it has been 
arranged so that the actual majority does not rule. 

The truth is, that the world has had a very long expe- 
rience with all sorts of methods to keep the majority 
from ruling. In our own Country we began by requiring 
that a citizen should have a certain amount of property, 
and, in Massachusetts, that he should be a member of the 
church. Such rules have held in England, where, till 
lately, the minority have governed the country. In the 
German city of Berlin, the owners of property have more 
votes than the poorer people. 

It is curious to find that the better educated and well- 
to-do people, when they have had the whole power, 
have not succeeded very well in governing. They have 
voted for themselves and made laws for their own inter- 
ests. They have not even agreed among themselves, 



68 THE AMERICA N PA TRIOT 

but have often had bitter quarrels and sometimes civil 
war. To own property does not necessarily make men 
just or wise. To be educated does not make them 
always fair-minded, or friendly or patriotic. On the 
contrary, poor men, and even unlearned men, may be 
quite honest, and hearty patriots besides. Moreover, if 
ever the need comes to fight for one's Country, the poor- 
est and most ignorant are called on to offer their lives. 
Is it fair, then, that they shall have no voice in deciding 
whether or not there ought to be a war ? Is it fair that 
they shall not say whether they approve the laws under 
which they must live ? 

Let us suppose, however, that we are going to shut 
out a part of the peop^ from voting. Who have the 
right to shut out the others ? Have the rich a right to 
shut out the poor? Have the educated the right to shut 
out the unlearned ? Have the good the right to put a 
brand on those whom they think to be bad ? How can 
anyone tell in advance who is good and who is bad ? 

Thus it seems to be impossible to lay down any other 
rule than the one which we have made in America, 
namely, that the majority of all the people shall govern. 
Indeed, all the civilized nations in the world are marching 
along towards the same rule which we have established. 
This is not because the rule of the majority is always 
perfectly fair, but because we do not know any other 
plan that is so nearly fair. It will often happen that the 
minority, whom the majority has voted down, will not 
and cannot be contented. But this is not so bad as it 
was when the minority ruled and the majority were dis- 
contented, especially when they could not do anything 
to right their wrongs. It will doubtless sometimes hap- 
pen that the majority will vote to do wrong things and 
will tax the others to pay for them, or will even compel 
the whole nation to do a wrong. But bad as this is, it is 
not so bad as when the minority of the nation do wrong 
continually and prevent the majority from setting the 



THE AMERICAN PATRIOT 6 9 

wrong right. Thus many a wicked war has been brought 
on in times past by only the few who have required all 
the others to pay and to fight. 

We come now to what maybe called the "safety- 
valve " of our American institutions. If the majority ever 
do wrong, if they are mistaken, or prejudiced, or unjust, 
as long as all the people are free, the few who are voted 
down to-day can persuade the others and get the major- 
ity themselves to-morrow. The majority will never stay 
on the wrong side very long. 

There is a deep principle of justice underneath our 
American motto of Majority Rule. It is the principle of 
the Golden Rule. The idea is that when we are voted 
down we will behave as we would wish the others to 
behave when our turn comes and we vote them down. 
It is with men in carrying on the government as it is 
with the boys on the play-ground. It often happens that 
the boys cannot agree. There will be boys who, when 
they cannot have their own way, stop playing and go 
home. We call it mean and selfish in the boys to spoil 
the play for all, merely because they do not happen to be 
suited. We like the boys who give up their own way 
and play the game out and wait till some other day when 
their turn* will come. 

Certain hard questions however remain, and I propose 
in another chapter to show what rights the minority has 
and what the majority ought to do in order to protect 
these rights. 

Questions 

What is the majority ? When have all the people ever 
voted one way ? How do you account for the fact 
that people so often disagree ? Is this a good or a bad 
thing, in the long run ? 

What ways can you think of for settling differences of 
opinion ? What is our American motto ? What did 
the Civil War teach us ? 



7 o THE AMERICAN PA TRIOT 

What faults can you see in the working of majority rule ? 
Would you believe in it if you lived in Mexico ? What 
wrong or foolish things can you recall that majorities 
have voted to do? About what sort of things are 
majorities very likely to be in the wrong ? 

What sort of people ought really to govern ? Can you 
think of any plausible reasons for letting the richer 
people or the educated have more votes than the poor 
and the ignorant ? Do you think that the graduates of 
the high-schools would give us a better government 
than we have now ? 

Show where the world has tried the experiment of mi- 
nority rule. How has the experiment worked ? 

What reasons can you give for letting all the people 
vote? Can you think of any set of people who are 
good or wise enough to have the right to shut out 
their fellows from voting ? 

Why, on the whole, do we believe in the majority rule ? 
Can you think of any other better plan ? 

What is a safety-valve ? What is the safety-valve of our 
American institutions ? What chance has a discon- 
tented minority always in America ? 

What has the Golden Rule to do with our idea of the 
majority ? Give an illustration. 



Burdens become light when cheerfully borne. — Ovid. 

You have not fulfilled every duty unless you have ful- 
filled that of being cheerful and pleasant. — Buxton. 

If I can put one touch of a rosy suifset into the life of 
any man or woman, I shall feel that I have worked with 
God. — G. Macdonald. 

No man has come to true greatness who has not felt in 
some degree that his life belongs to his race, and that 
what God gives him He gives him for mankind. — c Broohs. 




^^liV Qtizenship ^W/wr^.4? 



THE AMERICAN PATRIOT 



Chapter i i 
MINORITIES AND THEIR RIGHTS 

We have agreed when people differ about the conduct 
of their government, that the fairest rule, on the whole, 
is to do what the larger number, or the majority, prefer. 
But we have had to admit that this favorite American 
way has great dangers. The truth is, that a number of 
men may be as tyrannical as any king or despot. A ma- 
jority may be wilful, unjust, cruel and oppressive. There 
are communities in the United States where the minority 
are not even allowed to express their opinions. Ignorance 
is always intolerant of opposition. 

In framing a government there must therefore be fair 
provision made for safeguarding the minority. This is 
really for the good of the majority also, for we have 
already seen that the majority is extremely apt to make 
mistakes and to get upon the wrong side. All new ideas 
for better government, all reforms of old abuses, are like- 
ly to originate with a few persons. The majority do 
not care for the new ideas ; they very likely distrust them. 
It is indeed through the growth of minorities to become 
majorities that everything good is brought about. Thus 
in the old days before the Civil War it was at first only 
a minority of people who resisted the spread of slavery 
into our new States. They were unsuccessful for many 
years. At last, however, the great Republican party grew 
out of this "Free Soil" minority, and swept the country 
with their votes. Every intelligent person is now glad 



72 THE AMERICAN PATRIOT 

that they succeeded. It has proved to be good for the 
whole country — for the South as well as for the North — 
that the anti-slavery minority was not suppressed, as 
many once desired. 

What has happened once, is always likely in some new 
form to happen again. New questions are forever com- 
ing up. The old successful majority wakes up to see a 
new minority threatening to supplant it and turn it out. 
Our laws therefore are intended to give all needful free- 
dom for the minority of to-day to become the majority 
to-morrow. 

One way in which we secure fair play for the minority 
is by the frequency of our elections. It is possible that 
in some cases we have elections too often. But this is 
better for our liberties than it would be to make the elec- 
tions very infrequent — once in eight or ten years, for 
instance. As it is now, the people in power have to de- 
fend their position by good behavior, or they will be 
turned out. Besides, the ideas which the minority stand 
for are published abroad at every election; they are dis- 
cussed; they are criticised and defended and brought into 
more clearness. The people are educated by having to 
think about them and understand them. 

The minority are also given fair play in our country by 
the fact that we are divided into so many political bodies. 
The minority is not obliged to wait till it can become the 
majority of all the people of the United States; but it 
may win its way in one State at a time; or, even when 
it is yet the smaller number in the State, it may have a 
majority in some of the towns or cities. Its leaders have 
thus a chance to try their hand at actual government, and 
often to apply their principles and to give an object lesson 
of how they will work. Thus the Prohibition principle 
is on trial before the country to-day. It controls a 
minority in the Nation. But it has certain States in 
which it is at work showing the American people 
whether or not it is desirable to be applied everywhere. 



THE AMERICA X PATRIOT 73 

It is evident that the minority ought to enjoy perfect 
freedom of speech and of the press. Suppose, as in 
Russia and indeed in Germany, the people with the new 
ideas were liable to arrest whenever they spoke in public. 
Suppose the laws did not protect their newspapers, but 
as in the case of the brave Lovejoy in Illinois, a mob was 
allowed to destroy the printing office and kill the editor. 
Or suppose the majority in Congress were unwilling to 
hear the petitions of the unpopular minority, as was the 
fact when John Quincy Adams, ''the old man eloquent " 
from Massachusetts, vindicated the sacred right of peti- 
tion ; whenever the minority are not suffered to utter their 
thoughts, the majority strike at the liberties of all 
the people . 

Yes, some one says, but what if the minority are fool- 
ish and wrong? The truth is, it is bad enough to be fool- 
ish and wrong and on the unpopular side, without being 
muzzled also. Indeed, there is no help so great to rescue 
men from their folly as to require them to publish and 
explain it and let the daylight in upon it. 

Another protection which we give to the minority is 
by our veto system. The Mayor, or the Governor, or the 
President is supposed to represent the whole body of his 
citizens. He does not belong to the majority merely, who 
have elected him, but when chosen he is in office for the 
interests of all. If therefore the majority seem to him to 
have passed an act hurtful to the people, he is required 
not to sign the bill and so to let it become law, but to re- 
turn it to the Council or Legislature or Congress that 
passed it, with his objections. The rule is then, that if 
it is passed again over his veto, it must have not merely 
a majority of votes as before, but as large a number as 
two thirds of the votes. 

This is not the only case when the rule is to require 
more than a majority of the votes. For instance, if the 
majority wish to alter the Constitution of the State or the 
Nation, and, for example, to introduce into it a clause 



74 THE AMERICAN PATRIOT 

prohibiting the liquor traffic, this change cannot be made 
by a mere majority. Such rules illustrate the extreme 
desire of those who framed our institutions to give the 
minority all possible protection. 

The Constitution itself is a resource against the abuse 
of the minority. Let a careless majority pass an injurious 
law threatening the liberties or the property of any class 
of the people, and the courts are open to determine 
whether the law is in line with the Constitution, and if 
not, to set it aside. The courts have repeatedly dis- 
approved such laws in the interest of justice to the 
minority. 

It ought to be noted in passing that almost everywhere 
there has been a breaking down of the majority rule in 
favor of a plurality. Thus when an election is held for 
Mayor or for President, the winning candidate is not the 
one who gets the majority of all the votes, but the one 
who gets more than any one else. By this custom we 
have actually made it possible for a clear minority of the 
people of the United States to control the Executive 
branch of our government. As a matter of fact, when 
Mr. Lincoln was elected the first time, a majority of the 
citizens of the Republic were opposed to the ideas for 
which he stood. In a city, likewise, it may be possible 
for a party with only one third of the votes to get com- 
plete control of the city. This change to the plurality 
rule carries very grave objections and may sometimes 
actually mean the frustration of the will of the majority. 

In spite of all our provision for the minority, bad 
abuses are still possible. Suppose in the State of Ver- 
mont a third of the people are Democrats and the rest are 
Republicans. It may happen for years that the Demo- 
crats of the State are never represented in Congress, and 
hardly at all in the Legislature. Here is taxation without 
representation! Suppose that a quarter of the people of 
a city wish unpartisan administration. It may be with 
our present system that this minority never can elect an 



THE AMERICAN PATRIOT 75 

Alderman. In other words, on a Board of sixteen men, 
where they would be entitled honestly to four places, 
they have no place. Here is a defeat of the purpose 
of representative government. In a true representative 
body each party of citizens surely ought to have its fair 
proportionate share of votes. There is accordingly a 
movement on foot to correct this evil by what is called 
Proportional Representation. The idea appeals to the 
sense of fair play in the American people. When it is 
carried into effect, the majority will still rule, that is, will 
hold the executive reins, and will pass the laws, but 
each reasonable minority will have a voice in making the 
laws, and will have its vote counted whether for or 
against the proposed law. 

Is it not possible, some one may still ask, even in the 
United States, that the majority will carry laws which 
would compel the minority to do what they think to be 
wrong? The old law which required free men to restore 
slaves to their masters was such a law. The Sunday 
laws in some States seem to be an oppression to t^ 
Seventh Day Baptists or to the Jews. The fact is, it is 
hard to live in human society and yet be independent 
and conscientious, and not sometimes have to take the 
unpopular side. Sometimes duty requires us merely to 
speak and to vote with the few. Sometimes one must 
bear ridicule and even abuse. It may be that petty 
injustice will be done. But it is very rare that duty bids 
the minority to resist the action of the laws except by 
agitation and argument. The good and the true is always 
stronger than the bad or the false. It only needs plenty 
of light and it will win the many to its side. 

Questioxs 

Do you know of any instances in which the majority has 
been tyrannical? Why cannot new ideas generally be 
popular? Why ought we to thank the pioneers who 
bring us new political ideas ? 



76 THE AMERICAN PATRIOT 

Give illustrations of such new ideas that began as unpop- 
ular and finally won over the multitudes. 

How does it help the minority to allow frequent elec- 
tions? What objection, if any, do you see to this 
custom ? 

What is a strongly " centralized " government ? Give an 
instance of such a government. What advantages 
have minorities in our country because we are not 
centralized ? 

How far do you believe in perfect liberty of speech ? 
Would you let '' anarchists " publish what they 
thought ? Give reason for your answer. What safe- 
guard have we against all foolish ideas ? 

What is the veto power? Show how it works in some 
particular case. How does it tend to protect a mi- 
nority ? To whom does the Governor or the President 
belong ? 

Can you give instances where a two-thirds vote is 
required ? Why would not this be a good rule 
always ? Do you think it would be right for a majority 
of the people to enter upon a war against the protest 
of a large minority of the people ? 

How may oppressive laws often be set aside ? 

What objections do you see to the plurality system ? 
What reasons are there in its favor? 

What is Proportional Representation ? Show the need 
and the fairness of it. 

What ought a minority to do if they are oppressed or 
bidden to obey unjust laws ? Would it ever be right 
in a free country to take up arms against the laws ? 




citizenship J% 



THE AMERICAN PATRIOT 

Chapter 12 

TRUSTING THE PEOPLE 

We have seen that it is our American way to let the 
people rule. This splendid experiment which we are 
working out in this country springs from a deep princi- 
ple which deserves careful attention. It is the principle 
of trust. In other words we in America believe in trust- 
ing one another, in trusting our neighbors, in trusting 
the people who live on the other side of the continent, in 
trusting the men in the other political party and not our 
own party alone, in trusting even the thousands of immi- 
grants who come over here from Russia, Italy and Hungary. 

This is rather a new idea in the world. Not all Amer- 
icans have yet caught its meaning. The common habit 
of mankind has been to treat each other with suspicion 
or fear. There is a great deal of suspicion everywhere. 
Men who deem themselves quite fit for any office often 
seem to doubt whether their neighbors have any common 
sense. Men often distrust the people in the opposite 
party, and fear, if they get into power, that they will ruin 
the country. There are many good people who are ex- 
tremely shy of all " foreigners." They imagine that cer- 
tain classes of immigrants are hostile to our government. 
They fear that men come to plot against our institutions, 
our liberties, our public schools. All these fears and sus- 
picions survive from the wild times when men thought 
that most other men, especially men of another tribe or 



78 THE AMERICAN PATRIOT 

language, hated them. These suspicions come over here 
still from the armed camps in which the governments of 
Europe continue to keep their people ready for war. We 
certainly have to face the fact that these fears and suspi- 
cions have deep and long roots and are not easily cast 
out of men's minds. Nevertheless the foundation of our 
American system of government is in the new idea of 
trusting one another. 

Let us see how much this new idea means, and be sure 
that it is really practicable to trust men. Some years ago 
the famous missionary explorer, David Livingstone, made 
his way, unattended by a single white companion, across 
the continent of Africa. He had to pass through numer- 
ous savage tribes who could easily have robbed and 
killed him. Most men would have said in advance that 
he could never accomplish his undertaking. But his ar- 
mor was in his fearlessness and trust. He treated the 
blacks as men and friends, and he expected friendly treat- 
ment in return. To expect the best of men is to help them 
to give their best. If Livingstone, on the contrary, had 
shown any fear or suspicion he would have called out the 
suspicion and hate of the savages and he would have un- 
doubtedly been killed immediately. So marvelously the 
new idea of trust works even among wild men ! 

We all know the same fact in thousands of schools. 
Let the teacher expect mischief, let him show suspicion 
to his scholars, let him, worse yet, imagine that his boys 
take- him for their natural enemy and he will invariably 
have trouble with that school. He will show the boys 
by his suspicion that he does not know human nature. 
But let the teacher assume from the start that he and the 
boys are friends, let him look for honor and fairness in 
the school, let him expect their best of his scholars, in 
short let him trust them and he will get what he expects. 
True, they will be boys still, they will not be rid of all 
their faults at once. But the habit of trust will prove the 
key to the best possible success with the school. 



THE AMERICAN PATRIOT 79 

Now we in America believe in the working of the 
same rule of trust, without which our government simply 
cannot go on. We assume that the average citizen means 
to be fair and just. We hold that, much as he wants his 
own interests to flourish, he does not intend to trample 
on our interests. We assume, even when he votes 
against us, that he does not mean to wrong us if he gets 
the power. If he is at the West and we are at the East 
we assume that he loves the common country and re- 
gards the common flag. If he is a rich man and we are 
poor, we are slow to suspect that he would oppress us. 
If he is a Socialist and we think that he is mistaken, we 
do not believe that the Socialists propose to take away 
any real rights which we possess. If he is fresh from 
Bohemia we choose to assume that he will swing into 
line and help support our American institutions. If he is 
a Catholic and we are Protestants, we expect him to be 
a patriot in America. Some one will shake his head and 
say that these are bold assumptions. I reply that only so 
far as we proceed on these assumptions and actually trust 
one another, has our government any strength . Wher- 
ever on the contrary you find enmity, distrust, the lively 
expectation of mischief and conspiracy, you find popular 
government endangered. 

The story of the Civil War illustrates this law. The 
Civil War was bred of suspicion and partisan and section- 
al distrust. Lincoln trusted the people that they wouIJ 
do the fair thing. If the party leaders, and especially 
those in ihe South, had trusted the people as Lincoln did, 
it is safe to affirm that the war could not have taken 
place. The method of trust, congenial with our institu- 
tions, would have found another way to get rid of slavery. 

I know what some will answer. They see in our gov- 
ernment only a sort of rude conflict of competing and 
hostile interests, as when the billiard ball by repeated 
blows, each in a different direction, at last comes to a 
stop. So they say that which is done by the conflict of 



So THE AMERICAN PA TRIOT 

votes is the resultant of the diverse energies of men and 
parties who suspect one another as enemies. There is a 
show of truth in this picture. But the deeper truth is 
that in all our conflicts we are always learning better to 
trust each other. We have found out repeatedly that 
there are good and fair men in the other party. When 
they have got into power they have not wrecked the ship. 
Whenever we have appealed to their sense of justice they 
have been willing to meet us. In fact they are human 
like ourselves. We do our best when others expect our 
best of us. So do the men of the opposite party. 

What shall we say, however, to this square objection 
against trusting the people ? It is urged that they are 
not yet just or intelligent enough to be trusted. As a 
matter of fact, they are full of all kinds of prejudice. They 
go crazy with wild theories about money and other diffi- 
cult subjects. They are easily led by demagogues. It 
may indeed be necessary to let them vote, but how can 
one help fearing the people, being such as they are, with 
millions of the ignorant and uncivilized ? 

We trust the people precisely as we trust the boys in 
the school-room, or as Livingstone trusted the wild men. 
We do not trust them blindly, but intelligently. We do 
not hold that they will always do wisely or that they 
will immediately do what they see is right. We merely 
insist that there are two distinct ways of treating them. 
One is to treat them on the side of their ignorance, and 
so to fear and suspect whatever they do. This is the 
old-world method through which the people were not 
regarded as fit to do anything except obey their masters. 
The other method is always to treat the people on the 
side of their manhood. This is to trust them, to take 
their advice, to give them responsibility, to respect their 
humanity, to appeal ever to their common sense and their 
conscience, to hope even if they fail to-day that they will 
do better to-morrow. 

Let us see, however, whom else we should trust, if we 



THE AMERICAN PA TRIOT 8 1 

give up trusting the people. Shall we trust some one 
man? Or, shall we trust the men who own property? 
Shall we trust the educated men? Shall we trust the 
ministers of religion ? The world has tried a good many 
experiments of all sorts and has met with constant disap- 
pointments. It does not make men trustworthy to give 
them property or education, or a long creed. The only 
experiment in trusting men that has ever worked has 
been on the ground, not of their property or their learn- 
ing or their professions of religion, but on the simple 
ground of their manhood. A poor man, as far as his man- 
hood goes, is just as trustworthy as a rich man. An un- 
lettered man is as worthy of trust as a scholar, upon the 
sole ground which trust touches. 

Moreover, it is not good for men to be trusted with 
other people's business, such as they can do for them- 
selves. It is good to share in the business of the world. 
It is well to specialize certain men to do certain things, 
like inventing machinery, which they can do better than 
the rest of us. But suppose men bring to any one man, 
or to a few men, the decision of their own common af- 
fairs, suppose they leave to umpires the responsibility for 
using their time and spending their money, suppose they 
let others decide what trade they shall take and when 
they ought to marry — all this shifting of responsibility is 
bad at both ends — for the men who get rid of their own 
affairs and for the men who allow themselves to meddle 
with others' business. Neither does it matter how wise 
the meddlers are. If, therefore, we could find a hundred 
wise men to-morrow into whose hands we could put the 
whole political business of the American people, and who 
would not make any mistakes or spend one extravagant 
dollar, but who should tell us all precisely what to do, 
without the trouble of depositing a vote or ever enter- 
taining a puzzling question, we would choose to go on 
as we do now, blundering all the time, but learning 
always better how to trust one another. 



82 THE AMERICAN PATRIOT 

The truth is that to trust men to manage their own 
affairs is an education of their manhood. Trust a man in 
state-prison and you help to make a man of him. Trust 
the people, load responsibility upon them, appeal often 
to their patriotism and you civilize them. We in Amer- 
ica are not merely seeking an honest and economical ad- 
ministration. We are seeking a nation of men who 
know what honesty and economy are. 

Certain qualifications need, however, to be made. If 
we say that we trust the people we mean that we trust 
them when they are fully informed. The people, indeed, 
often disappoint their friends because they do not yet 
know the subject or the question upon which they vote. 
We must therefore give them plenty of time and informa- 
tion. Suppose we ask the people to vote on Proportional 
Representation. They will say Yes when they under- 
stand the issue, but meantime we must be patient with 
them. 

Again, we can trust the people on simple questions, 
and especially whenever they can see a plain issue of 
right or wrong. The people thus thought out the issue 
of slavery quite rapidly, quite as fast as the rich men or the 
educated class, or the ministers of religion. But the peo- 
ple cannot be fairly asked to thresh out difficult problems, 
such as currency and banking. This is not because they 
are unworthy of trust, but because there are many sub- 
jects that need the wisdom and experience of experts. 
Thus the people may decide whether they wish to spend 
their money for a new State House or City Hall, but they 
ought not to pass upon the proposed plans of the new 
building. 

It is here that our government becomes representative. 
The people, who are trusted in large and general ques- 
tions, themselves trust their best aud most valued men 
(such is the theory, badly as it is as yet applied) to take 
up the public business in detail. The people commonly 
pay for the time of their representatives so as to have the 



THE AMERICAN PATRIOT 83 

benefit of their best service. They practically say to their 
representatives : Do your very best in our behalf. Is it 
not a shame that their representatives so often fail to hear 
or heed their commission ? 



Questions 

What great principle is at the root of our government in 
America ? 

What class of people, if any, ought not to be trusted ? 
How does it work when men distrust one another? 

Give instances to show what "trusting people" ac- 
accomplishes. 

Do you think that the average citizen means to do justly 
by others? Do you think that our immigrants love 
the flag ? What did they do in the Civil War ? What 
caused the Civil War ? Show what the habit of distrust 
had to do with it. 

What was President Lincoln's method of treating men? 

How far can we trust ignorant citizens? 

Is there any class of men who can altogether be trusted 
not to make any mistakes ? 

How does trusting the people educate them ? What else 
do we want to effect by our government besides econ- 
omy or efficiency ? 

What must the people have in order to be trusted? 

What sort of questions are most suited for decision by 
the whole people ? Give instances. What arrange- 
ment do we make to settle difficult questions ? 

What single demand do we make upon our representa- 
tives? 

Do you know what the " referendum " is ? What dp 
you think of it? 



ir jJIV Qtizenship 





THE AMERICAN PATRIOT 



Chapter 13 
PUBLIC OPINION 

The most mighty forces in the world are invisible. 
Gravitation and electricity are such forces. So in hu- 
man affairs and in the government of nations the 
most active and efficient forces work out of sight. Such 
a force is what we have come to call public opinion. It 
is hard even to tell precisely what it is. We can explain 
it best by illustration. Thus it is the public opinion of a 
crowd of school boys that it is mean business to tell 
tales to the master. There is no law against a tell-tale. 
Indeed there are cases when it might be the duty of an 
honorable boy to try to prevent some disgraceful deed by 
exposing it. Nevertheless public opinion was strong 
against such a cause. 

So likewise it was the public opinion in the American 
Colonies before the Revolution that the British Parliament 
was unjust in taxing America. Perhaps only a few peo- 
ple could have told why it was unjust to tax the Colonies 
which the the British government protected. There were 
doubtless honest tories in the Colonies, like Hutchinson 
of Massachusetts, who saw the British side of the ques- 
tion. Nevertheless, when somehow the idea Hashed into 
the minds of a great many people that they were suffer- 
ing an injustice, this made a different opinion. In gen- 
eral we may say that whatever people are feeling and 



THE AMERICAN PA TRIOT 85 

thinking together, whatver they largely agree about, 
this public opinion. It is as if the minds and hearts of 
the people made a great stream running one way. Or, 
it is as if they were all magnetized, so as to point together 
in the same direction. When, therefore, the people are 
pretty evenly divided on any subject, or before they have 
made up their minds, we do not call this state of con- 
fusion or division public opinion. The stream may 
have eddies in its course, but in order to make good 
public opinion, the bulk of its volume must run decidedly 
one way. 

It is worth noticing also that there is a sort of public 
opinion that belongs to every set or group or community 
by itself. Men arrange themselves like the variously- 
colored strata of sand on a hill-side. There is a sort of 
public opinion of the lawyers and of the labor unions. 
There was a different public opinion in South Carolina in 
i860 from that which was" held in Vermont. The real 
public opinion, however, is that which sways the great 
mass of the people. It affects rich and poor, the better 
educated and the less educated, as, for instance, in 
the great wave of the public will of the people of 
the North to save the nation after Fort Sumter had been 
fired upon. 

It is easy now to see what public opinion does. You 
find it at work in quite barbarous states. It limits the 
power of despots. They risk their thrones whenever 
they break over the lines of the established customs of 
their people. It is public opinion that make revolutions 
possible in Asia, as in Europe. Public opinion is stronger 
than armies, for the armies will not- fight against the 
cause which all men have at heart. Let public opinion 
in Germany grow in favor of peace, let the great masses 
of working people feel what they begin to feel now, that 
the interest of all the workers of the world are one, and 
no Emperor William could command a regiment to fight 
against the general opinion of the people. 



86 THE AMERICAN PA TRIOT 

Public opinion is deeper and stronger than laws and* 
institutions. If the laws do not express what the people 
really believe, if the laws require one thing and public- 
opinion allows the opposite, no law can be long enforced. 
Thus the temperance laws depend everywhere upon 
public opinion. Even when the public vote these laws, 
if they do not honestly believe in them, the laws become 
a dead letter. On the other hand if any community had 
established a public opinion in favor of temperance, if it 
was a disgrace in that community to use the alcoholic 
beverages, if men there had learned better ways of spend- 
ing their evenings than to frequent drinking saloons, in 
the presence of such a public opinion there would 
scarcely be the need of any temperance laws. 

So with the institutions of government. There are so- 
called republics in South America which are not true 
republics. This is for the want of enlightened public 
opinion, on which all our liberties rest. The fear of the 
fathers of our nation was that some successful politician or 
general might usurp the government and destroy our free- 
dom. They feared what the Napoleon 'did in France. 
But the Napoleons could not have seized France if public 
opinion had not permitted them. Neither could any one 
ever seize the power in the United States unless the peo- 
ple were willing. If our fathers had reason for distrust 
it was because they could not quite trust our people. 

Public opinion always seems to be shifting in its direc- 
tion and its weight. It is liable to change its vote from one 
course to the opposite. Thus public opinion was at one 
time bitterly against any agitation of the subject of 
slavery; whereas now every one is agreed that slavery 
was a national misfortune. So public opinion was once 
everywhere in favor of the use of wine and beer; now 
there are millions of men and women who think wine 
and beer are ar bad as poisons. This fickleness of public 
opinion is not altogether discouraging. Often it merely 
shows that the people have not yet thought about the 



THE AMERICAN PA TRIOT 8 7 

subject and made up their minds. The same force of 
public opinion which protects a bad habit, when once 
changed to the other side, will preserve the new principle. 
It is safe to say that the nation will never change its mind 
back again to take up slavery. Neither will the nation 
go back to monarchy. Show the people that any practice 
like dueling is barbarous, and public opinion, which is 
fickle about new and untried things, does not change 
back again to that practice. The good habits, customs 
and principles once learned come to stay. Indeed public 
opinion may be likened to the growth of a tree. At the 
tips of the twigs, where the new life is growing, you 
can easily check or alter the movement of growth. But 
as soon as the wood has had time to grow hard, and 
especially in the firm trunk of the tree, you can not easily 
alter the direction. 

The method of the working of public opinion in old 
times was mainly through what people said. The voice 
carried the current thought. One man told his neighbor; 
groups of neighbors talked together. Messengers 
galloped from one place to another. Orators addressed 
the people like Demosthenes at Athens. This was largely 
the case once in America. Now, at last, books and news- 
papers also add to the force of the popular current and 
give it direction. Cheap pictures make the unpopular 
thing ridiculous. The words of the orator are published 
for millions to read. Public opinion could never before 
move so fast and press with such weight. On the other 
hand there were never such masses of men to be stirred ; 
there were never such dense layers of ignorance to be 
enlightened; there were never such difficult questions, 
such as money, the tariff, the wise government of great 
cities, on which public opinion has to be formed. 

There is an evident danger that all this new machinery 
will be taken advantage of for the wrong ends. It is 
possible to stampede a crowd of minds for a little while, 
as hunters stampede a hend of buffaloes. Set the papers 



88 THE AMERICAN PATRIOT 

talking in any wild direction, send out pamphlets and 
speeches, and even a few designing or self-deluded 
demagogues may presently stir the minds of multitudes of 
voters, who will not thereafter be easily persuaded that 
they were led astray. In fact it seems at times as if the 
people were hypnotized by strange delusions. Never- 
theless the sturdy faith of Abraham Lincoln holds good. 
4 'You can cheat some of the people all the time; and you 
can cheat all the people some of the time; but you never 
can cheat all of the people all of the time." 

Moreover, what the mischievous or the ignorant can 
do on occasion in making and shaping public opinion, 
the wise and patriotic may do all the more forcibly. The 
good can and do write books and make speeches. They 
also can set the newspapers at work sowing the good 
seed broadcast. This has been illustrated a great many 
times. It is only a few years since all the offices of the 
government were made a means of bribery for the benefit 
of the party in power. Efficient and honest officers were 
turned out of their places whenever a new administra- 
tion came in. There was no public opinion to hinder 
this gross injustice and abuse of the people's business, 
but a few disinterested men like George William Curtis, 
Carl Schurz and Dorman B. Eaton organized a little com- 
pany of men who believed that the Civil Service ought to 
be for the benefit of the people of the United States. 
They wrote for the newspapers; they held meetings; 
they told their friends what ought to be d^ne; they 
enlisted the best men in the great political parties in the 
endeavor to stop this kind of bribery; and now we find 
popular majorities, as in the city of Chicago, voting for 
Civil Service Reform. The truth is that the right thing, 
whenever the people see what it is, appeals to them as 
the thing to be done. 

We get an idea here of what public opinion has to do 
with the running of our government. There is a Legis- 
lature or a city council who are tempted to do an unjust 



TH E AMERICAN PATRIOT 89 

or extravagant thing, The few have usurped the real 
power and threaten to legislate for themselves or for 
some railroad which they are bribed to serve. Suppose 
now that the City or the State is filled with intelligent, 
independent and public-spirited citizens; suppose they 
call popular meetings at once; suppose all the papers 
show up the bad scheme; suppose numerous letters rain 
in upon the legislators protesting against the bad bill; is 
it not clear that public opinion is now the power behind 
the throne? No one will dare to face it when it is 
aroused. 

Better still, suppose public opinion in favor of honest 
government has grown strong, suppose the people will 
not vote for selfish men, suppose they demand true, high- 
minded men who will serve the public without fear or 
favor, suppose thus a strong and enlightened public 
opinion is represented in the State House and in the City 
Hall — now you have in reality a " government of the 
people, by the people, and for the people." 

Questions 

What are the great forces of the world ? What unseen 
forces are behind human affairs? Illustrate what pub- 
lic opinion is. 

What sort of public opinion holds among lawyers or 
labor-unions ? How was the public opinion of Ver- 
mont in i860 different from that of South Carolina? 

Give an instance of national public opinion; of inter- 
national public opinion. 

How does public opinion touch kings ? How is it 
stronger than armies ? How is it behind the laws ? 
Which is the stronger, laws without public opinion, or 
public opinion without laws ? Illustrate this. 

Show how fickle public opinion often is. Why is not 
this discouraging ? 

How is public opinion made and guided ? What danger 
can you see that bad men will make bad public opinion? 
Show how this has been done. What cure of this 
evil do you see ? Give some instance of the making 
of good public opinion? How can public opinion 
stop abuses in government ? How can it establish the 
highest kind of government ? How can each one help 
in this ? 








j^r^ 



THE AMERICAN PATRIOT 



Chapter 14 
HOW TO TREAT FOREIGNERS 

Who are foreigners? Once the answer to this question 
meant almost all the people of the world. Each little 
Greek city stood by itself. Athens hardly had peaceful 
dealings with its neighbors, Thebes and Corinth, a few 
miles away. To Greeks all the rest of the world were 
barbarians. So with the Jews. Perhaps there were two 
or three millions of them, and all other people were Gen- 
tiles or "foreigners." Even the Samaritans, who spoke 
the same language and lived only a day's march from 
Jerusalem, were outsiders. After Europe called itself 
Christian, foreigners were everywhere thought to be "fair 
game" for the natives of each little kingdom to plunder, 
or cheat or insult. 

We have taken a new idea about foreigners in America. 
In the first place we have bound forty States together, so 
that no citizen of one of them is a foreigner or outsider 
anywhere between the two oceans. Through thousands 
of miles, wherever an American travels, he is a citizen. 
Imperial Rome did this for part of its people, but we do 
it for all. 

Moreover, most of our forefathers came from England; 
many came also from Ireland and Germany and Holland. 
We cannot think, therefore, of the lands from which our 
fathers came as foreign soil. No man in the world who 
speaks the English language is really a foreigner. No 



THE * I MER /( \ I N PA TRIO T 9 l 

man who speaks German or Dutch or Norwegian, the 
language of our cousins, is a foreigner. 

This is not all. We teach that foreigners are men like 
ourselves. Whereas, once it was thought that foreigners 
were inferior to natives, we say that all races of men are 
so many children of the one Father in Heaven. All are 
capable of improvement and civilization. But are not 
some peoples inferior to others? Yes. This maybe, pre- 
cisely as some native Americans are less strong and cap- 
able than others. This is a reason why the weaker or 
less able should have the more patience and sympathy 
shown them. It is not a reason why they should be de- 
spised and, much less, hated. So if any foreign people are 
really inferior, we do not propose for that reason to handi- 
cap them and make their lot worse. 

The fact is, we do not much like to use the word "for- 
eigner." A bit of familiar history will show us why. 
It is only a little while since we ourselves were strangers 
on this continent. We were all foreigners when we 
came over. What right have we, then, whose fathers 
happened to be on the ground a little earlier, to call other 
men just like ourselves foreigners who have arrived 
more recently ? Or what sense is there in calling the 
people foreigners over the sea, who are the fathers and 
mothers, and brothers and sisters of those who are our 
own fellow citizens ? 

All this was so simple to the founders of our republic 
that they conceived the idea of making this land a sort of 
home of refuge and a land of promise for the oppressed 
people of the world. Our national doors were thrown 
open. Here was plenty of land, and, as they thought, 
work enough for all willing hands. No nation had ever 
been so largely hospitable. The new comers were soon 
made citizens with equal rights. Thousands of these 
new comers fought side by side with the native born in 
the Civil War. Truly the word " foreign " is becoming 
outgrown in America, 



92 THE AMERICAN PATRIOT 

A grave question, however, faces the American people 
just now. Shall they go on treating all comers with this 
hearty welcome ? There are new languages and more 
distant natives coming to our shores. Italians, Poles, 
Russian Jews, Armenians are appearing in thousands. 
Great capitalists encourage their coming, so as to have 
plenty of cheap labor at hand. Steamship companies 
advertise to the millions to come to America, and 
make great profits out of very cheap fares. Once a few 
emigrants came at a time in little sailing vessels. Once 
they had saved money to buy a farm. Now a single ship 
may bring a thousand, They come often with hardly 
more than the clothing they wear. Sometimes it is sus- 
pected that their own government helps to pay the pas- 
sage money in order to get rid of men and women who 
are too ignorant to earn an honest living at home. 
Moreover, over the western sea, lies China with its 
hundreds of millions of people, industrious and tem- 
perate, but very poor, and willing to live upon what an 
American workman would waste. Meantime in our 
great cities are too many already who cannot get work 
enough to keep them from the danger line of cold and 
hunger. Thus the conditions of life in our great Repub- 
lic have changed. Shall we still keep our doors wide 
open to the world and bid all men welcome ? Or must 
we begin to put up barriers as though other people were 
strangers ? 

One point remains perfectly clear. It was always well 
to treat strangers as men, as we would wish to be treat- 
ed. We must do the same still. It does not follow that 
we must let the governments of Europe and the great 
steamships send us more people than we can make hap- 
py or comfortable. If the table is full of guests it is not 
only unkind to those who are seated, but it is unkind to 
the new-comers to crowd them into the room. Let the 
latter wait a little till there is vacant space. It may even 
be desirable, and quite friendly on occasion, for the host 



THE AMERICAN PA TRIOT 93 

to warn the traveling public that his house for the pres- 
ent \z full and that accommodations had better be 
sought elsewhere. So wi h the nation. If we have half 
a million or more people who cannot get continuous 
work, that is, who have not found their proper place in 
our American life, it cannot be true national hospitality to 
encourage others to come to us till we have taken good 
care of those who are nowhere. On the contrary, we 
owe it to the poor people of Italy and Russia to try in 
some way to inform them of our situation. This is not 
treating them as " foreigners," but as men like ourselves. 

Moreover it does not seem to be clearthat we in Amer- 
ica are helping the people who are left at home in the old 
countries by taking their emigrants. Do we relieve Ire- 
land or Germany or Poland by providing homes for their 
working people ? No. The people who stay behind in 
these countries go on suffering, sometimes from misrule, 
sometimes from bearing the burden of great armies and 
heavy taxes, and sometimes from actual oppression. 

Perhaps the greatest service that America has done for 
suffering nations has been in giving an object lesson of 
how a people may be happy and strong, without 
kings and noblemen to rule it, without big armies and 
navies, whose States are not separated by Custom-houses, 
who are free to travel and trade everywhere on equal 
terms, who have learned to treat each other as neighbors. 
If we take emigrants faster than we can make them hap- 
py and find places for them at our table, we shall cease to 
be so good an object lesson of "a government of the 
people, by the people, and for the people." It is time 
now for other nations to try to work out our experiment 
for the sake of their own people. It may do no harm if 
some of the emigrants stay at home and urge their gov- 
ernments to make their own national life happier. We 
do not want a world in which there shall be one or two 
great powerful republics, and all the rest of the nations 
shall be under the yoke of soldiers and emperors. We 



94 THE AMERICAN PA TRIOT 

want a world in which all the nations shall be finally as 
free and as happy as we have been. 

This brings us to another question, namely, how our 
government ought to treat other governments. The old 
way was to suspect, if not to hate, the governments 
across the border or over the sea. What was good for 
England, men thought, must be bad for France. What 
was bad for Europe must be good for America. Yes, 
men have often imagined it right to try to take advantage 
of the "foreign'' government, to cripple its power and 
rob it of territory. This was because men were uncivil- 
ized. It was also because nations often claimed territory 
that did not rightfully belong to them. Thus, when 
kings of England fought to hold lands in France, it was 
not strange that the kings of France watched their chance 
to get their French lands back. 

We are learning new ideas at last about other govern- 
ments. One of these new ideas is that the safest thing 
in the world is to treat every other government with per- 
fect justice. We in America wish nothing that really 
belongs to England or Russia. We propose to be quite 
honest. If we could get a slice of Canada by cheating or 
by force we would scorn to attempt it. To be just is 
better for a nation than to have a whole fleet of battle- 
ships. In fact it is the selfish and unjust government that 
needs to fight, as it is the thief or the rogue who has 
most reason to be afraid of his fellows. 

We are learning also that it is safe and wise to treat 
other governments frankly, instead of being suspicious 
of them. Governments are made up of men, and they 
behave as men do. If any one shows fear and suspicion 
of his neighbor, if he carries pistols when he meets the 
other, if he has "a chip on his shoulder" and expects to 
be insulted, he tempts the other to carry pistols also and 
perhaps even to insult him. Whereas, if he is fearless as 
an honest man can afford to be, if he expects his neighbor 
to behave "like a gentleman, " and therefore acts like a 



THE AMERICAN PA TRIOT 95 

gentleman himself, this conduct goes a good way to- 
wards helping the other to behave likewise. This is 
human nature. So if the Government of the United 
States expects fair and friendly treatment of Great Britain, 
this helps the British Government to be friendly toward us. 

We are learning also that it is not a good thing for 
America when Europe is in trouble. In fact when the 
people over the sea suffer and are poor, they cannot buy 
what America has to sell. But when the nations are all 
prosperous, trade is good here and there is a market for 
the products of our farms and shops. 

The truth is that the nations of the world are growing 
to be a great commonwealth. We all really belong to 
each other. What is good for one, as a rule, is good for 
the rest. What hurts one hurts others, as in the human 
body each part or member is needful to the rest. It 
follows then that armies and war ships already begin to 
appear to all thoughtful persons as a terrible barbarism. 
They are as foolish between governments as it is foolish 
between neighbors to build stone walls, mount cannon 
and carry firearms. The time is coming when civilized 
people will settle questions between each other by some 
sort of International Court, as all reasonable men now 
settle the private differences over which their ancestors 
fought duels. Children will wonder that our generation 
should have been teaching the Golden Rule in the Sun- 
day School while we were building wicked " commerce- 
destroyers " to sail the high seas. Nothing short of this 
reign of law and justice is the grand prophecy of civiliza- 
tion. 

— :the end: — 

Questions. 

What do you mean by a "foreigner?" What did Greeks 
and Hebrews once mean by " barbarians" and "Gen- 
tiles?" 



96 THE AMERICAN PATRIOT 

How large a number do we in America include as fellow- 
citizens ? Did any nation ever do the like before ? Do 
we call our cousins over the sea " foreigners ?" When, 
if ever, is it well to d r a\y the " foreign " line ? 

Are any people inferior to others ? If so, how should the 
sronger treat the weaker ? 

Why do we not much like the word foreigner} Were 
our fathers ever " foreigners ? " If so, when and how ? 

How did our land become a home for the oppressed ? 
Have the new-comers ever failed to stand by the flag ? 

Is there now a new kind of emigration to America ? Are 
we as able as ever to receive emigrants ? Show how 
the conditions have changed. 

What kind of treatment must we always show to 
strangers ? Is it the part of kindness to let all the peo- 
ple who may wish, come to our shores? What ought 
we to do for the greatest good of the greatest number? 

What is the greatest service that America has given to 
other nations ? What ought other nations now to do 
for themselves ? What is your idea of the happiest 
kin J of world ? 

What was the old idea of treating neighboring govern- 
ments ? How did England once feel towards France ? 
Why was this ? 

What is the safest conduct towards another nation ? 
What sort of persons or people are most likely to get 
into a quarrel ? 

Show how frank and gentlemanly treatment works 
towards helping others to show the same. 

Is it good or bad for us that other nations are prosperous ? 
Give your reasons. 

How are the people of the world truly related to each 
other ? Ought there ever to be wars ? Why is war a 
" barbarism ?" How ought nations to settle their dif- 
ferences ? Do you see any difficulty in this method ? 

What is the prophecy of civilization ? 

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